How rare is black smoke coat?

posiepurrs

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As previously stated, you could have pockets of cats having the inhibitor gene (the cause of smoke, shaded and chinchilla coloring), but in my lifetime I have not seen any moggies with it, only purebreds. That doesn't mean they don't exist! Mother Nature is a wonderful lady - she gives us surprises every day.
 

coniferously

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My Kimber is about a year and a half now and her undercoat is a grey colour. Her belly is very grey, as well as under her chin and the tuffs of fur on her pawpads. She also has a rust coloured tint to her fur. We shaved her back once because she was becoming a bit tangled, and all of a sudden we had a grey and black cat. We know her momma is a DSH all black and her dad is a feral, very large, mackerel tabby patterned, long haired, almost Norwegian Forest Cat or Maine Coon looking guy. He is very exotic looking. As a baby, Kimber looked more like a charcoal than a true black, and her grey was much more apparent.

This is Kimber now

Kimber as a baby

I don't really know what she is. I thought when I got her as a kitten she would grow up to be a more apparent smoke, but not so much. She's lovely none the less and I love her to bits.
 
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GoldyCat

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As previously stated, you could have pockets of cats having the inhibitor gene (the cause of smoke, shaded and chinchilla coloring), but in my lifetime I have not seen any moggies with it, only purebreds. That doesn't mean they don't exist! Mother Nature is a wonderful lady - she gives us surprises every day.
I have a black smoke & white cat and a blue smoke & white cat, littermates. I only saw the mother and other kittens once, from across a room so don't have any idea if there were more smokes there. The black smoke is really obvious because the contrast is so great.

The blue smoke not so much, but it is there.
 

amber lumbra

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I found a very black male cat with light grey mackerel swirls which are very hard to see without excellent lighting and he has a very white under coat. I also have a lilac Siamese female. Plans were to get them both fixed but my cats got frisky before I got to the vets so we now have four babies born five days ago....no Siamese babies but four very dark black and some have longer white hairs, some feature white masks across their eyes but very light not thick white, and a few even show stripes maybe like their dads under the black fur. I have a feeling that these babies are also going to be smokes as well. I am very excited to see their changes as they mature. I was wondering if anyone has seen a cat that def looks Siamese but that has the smoke gene also appearing....I know Siamese that are the more chocolate brown color turn darker on their bodies and I also know  their dark colors are also due to temps in the womb but wondering when I will know if these babies will be smokes or not, what age will it def be able to be seen, also can you be a Siamese with a smoke coat as well? Pictures?
 

Jason212

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Just came from the vet and she insisted that his smokey color is rare. This is my Pablo bear. Testudo cat with white hair underneath and full black hair on top. Nickname is paba-bear. ;)
 

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jcat

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Mowgli is a moggie found as a kitten of approximately 4 months near a feral cat colony consisting solely of black or gray-brown tabbies. He had no undercoat when we got him in a malnourished condition at 9 months, but has since developed a light gray one. The colony has been TNRed, but we've had a few black kittens from moms that escaped the trapping, and they've also had very light undercoats come colder weather and "adult" coats. There's been quite a bit of inbreeding because the colony is in an isolated area.
 

Kathryn_316

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IMG_5117.JPG I have this kitten, mom is a himalayan/ragdoll and dad is a weird grey with brownish tipped cat with just tabby in the face. One kitten appears to be black smoke. They are only 3 1/2 weeks old and he started to get a white undercoat just about a week ago. I understand it is suppose to be dominant color and there for he shouldnt be smoke, but he has a black and white brother with no white under his fur? What do you guys think.
IMG_5117.JPG
 

Katie M

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My cat Charlie has black fur and white skin. Does that qualify as black smoke? I can see it when he stretches, and the insides of his mouth and ears are white.
 

LauraMCannon23

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I am curious. Some places seem to say that black smoke is very rare in "moggies" (essentially mix breed cats with no purebred in them anywhere) but then had someone argue that they knew several strays at the shelter who had "black smoke" coloring. The coloring I am talking about is the CFA definition, not a unsound coat or slightly lighter undercoat, but a drastic difference between the top coat and undercoat. My rescue Raven is clearly a smoke, his hair shaft splits about halfway from black to light grey/white and it shows through when he moves.

So is Black Smoke rare in the DSH/DMH populations? Or is it common to find mixes with it?
I had to make an account so I could reply!
Here is a pic of my smoke tabby Ash's kitten! Yes, my smoke tabby made beautiful smoke tabby babies!

I have a cat that is half Ragdoll half American Short Hair. I believe she's rare because shes a smoke "ghost" tabby and looked nothing like her parents or the rest of the litter. That's why we chose her
She recently had kittens with our orange Maincoon cat. She had 5 kittens and 3 of them are smoke tabbies. This one in the photo is absolutely gorgeous!!!! A PERFECT example of a smoke tabby. I do believe it's a special gene and I do believe it's dominant. I still believe it's quite rare, considering that it's rarely ever found in pure bred cats, or half breeds like my female Ragdoll. I personally have never seen another cat like mine in person either.
 

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Summercats

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I have seen kittens/cats in the shelter that are smoke, including one gorgeous longhaired smoke kitten I wanted to pop in my bag:redheartpump::redheartpump:

Not the most common coloring but does occur outside of breeders trying to get it. I think in the shelter I visit, grey and brown tabby is the most common coloring.
 

gmm80

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This is interesting! I'm the foster coordinator for a rescue and I've only seen this type of coloring a few times.
This is one guy from a couple years ago, baby and adult photos:
IMG_20160601_024513592.jpg


And I have two foster fail kittens that I pulled from our local animal control. They came with 7 other kittens that were a mix of tabbies and siamese. I suspect these two may have come from another litter. The entire group had horrible herpes eye infections. They were actually dark chocolate brown when they were little, but they're 6 months old now and have shiny dark coats with light roots. The texture of their coats is also unusual, they have medium length hair, but they are not fluffy at all, their fur is soft and very flat.

20180430_234338.jpg

I'm very curious to see how their coloring will change as they get older.
 

Frankophile Feline Fan

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My Colette is a smoke. I have no idea about her parentage but I adopted her from 3 of her perfectly similar littermates at 9 weeks. The 2nd photo really captures the subtlety of her coloring. She usually appears solid black in pictures.
 

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XxMyCatsxX

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I am curious. Some places seem to say that black smoke is very rare in "moggies" (essentially mix breed cats with no purebred in them anywhere) but then had someone argue that they knew several strays at the shelter who had "black smoke" coloring. The coloring I am talking about is the CFA definition, not a unsound coat or slightly lighter undercoat, but a drastic difference between the top coat and undercoat. My rescue Raven is clearly a smoke, his hair shaft splits about halfway from black to light grey/white and it shows through when he moves.

So is Black Smoke rare in the DSH/DMH populations? Or is it common to find mixes with it?
 

Frankophile Feline Fan

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Colette is 11 months now. Yesterday I found fur lightened considerably behind her ears like two parentheses.

2 weeks ago clumps of fur appeared that were significantly longer than her other longish fur as you can see behind her front leg.

Pictures 3 & 4 are from when I brought her home for the first time. You can really see her smoke and frosting.

I wonder what she’ll look like in another year. Does anyone have some insight?
 

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