ragdoll baby?

[cam1983]

Hi my bf recued a baby kitten that was about 2 weeks old. His mother was seperated from him and he was in an open garage on a farm and in danger. We love him and wonder is he a ragdoll?

IMG]http://www.thecatsite.com/content/type/61/id/193278/width/200/height/400[/IMG]

 

[cam1983]

We've had him about 2months now. This is a recent pic. Our kids named him marshmallow

 

[maewkaew]

Oh my,  Marshmallow is adorable.  No,  he's not a Ragdoll , he is a beautiful little  Seal Point and White Domestic Shorthair  baby,  (DSH =  a shorthair cat of no particular breed ) .   But you're right that he has the same sort of color pattern as a Seal Bicolor Ragdoll.   He has a very pretty symmetrical pattern on his face.   

It's really impossible to know  if he has some Ragdoll ancestry.

In  your other thread,  someone mentioned Snowshoe  which would also be a similar pointed & white pattern combination in a shorthair.   and if you were to compare him to a breed,  that would be the closest in looks.    and you could call him a Snowshoe lookalike.  

The Snowshoe breed came from crossing Siamese with black & white American Shorthairs  (and they might have used some random-bred  " Domestic Shorthairs").   For some reason it just never became very popular.  partly because they wrote the standard to require a pattern that was very difficult to achieve consistently.  so breeders found it difficult to breed cats who met the standard.     It's actually a very rare breed so it is not likely he has pedigreed Snowshoe ancestors.    There are a lot more pointed & white domestic shorthairs / moggies than there are pedigreed Snowshoes.     But I guess one could say in a way he's a similar mix as the Snowshoe breed came from,   it's just likely that he has a lot more of the Western cat side and less of the Asian side.  

Basically,   the genes for his pattern are out there  in the general cat population.  

The pointed pattern --  which makes the most dense color restricted to the cooler parts of the body --   originally came from cats in Southeast Asia and got to the rest of the world via the Siamese.   But over the past 100+ years,   it has been widely spread throughout the cat populations in countries where the Siamese became popular,  due to Siamese and their descendents ( including other breeds who got it from the Siamese) mating with the  local moggies.     So by today  there are many " domestic shorthairs"  and " domestic longhairs"  who have this pointed  pattern.  and no doubt even more who aren't pointed but carry one copy of the gene -  & if 2 cats who have this gene mate and both give it to a kitten,  the kitten ends up with a pointed pattern.

  Then there 's another more common gene that causes white patches.  That's found in cats all over the world.    

&  Marshmallow has the combination of these 2 things  -- pointed pattern & white spotting.      That doesn't make him any specific breed.  but it does make him a very handsome kitten!

 

[cam1983]

Ok very helpful info, thank you! He is the purrfect addition to our family we love him [emoji]9829[/emoji]