Speculate about kitten genetics with me!

[xenonentity]

I'm a nerd and do this kind of thing for fun! I know I can't say for sure what their genetics are, since I don't even know who the father is, but it's fun to guess!

Here's Storm:

full album - Storm

She started out more red-brown when I first got her (she was around 3-4 weeks at that time), and she's been growing lighter and greyer as she's aged. She has no white, aside from the typical tabby white around the muzzle. I'm thinking her fur length is medium, which I believe is genetically longhair, but I'm sure someone here can correct me if I'm wrong, lol.

Storm's mom (Dolly):



Storm's brothers:



Dolly's mother and siblings:



Storm's dad is unknown, and very possibly a relative of her mother because ferals will do what ferals will do.


So my guesses:

Storm:
Black: Bx (Black)
Orange: oo (not orange)
White: ww (no white spotting)
Pattern: Ax / Mcx (tabby)
Dilution: dd / dmdm (dilute, no modifier)
Colorpoint: Cx (not colorpoint)
Coat length: ll (longhair)


Did I miss anything? Do you think I got something wrong? And what color would I describe her as? Grey tabby? Would love to discuss, and feel free to throw out your guesses as to the genetics of the rest of her family!!

 

[StefanZ]

Taken at a glance, I would describe her as a grey / blue tabby. sides not visible, but prob mackerel tabby (striped / tigrered in other languages).

But the darkest stripes are black, so she is what she once was: a brown / black tabby.... Why she become lighter, I dont know... But if you ever lose her, you will prob want to describe her as a grey tabby to an occasional bystander.

She may have colorpoint gene, but this we cant know.

Medium / shorthair; in unclear cases, look on the tail; if bushy so bushy. If not = shorthair...

Some shorthair do have relatively long hair for a shorthair.

 

[xenonentity]

StefanZ Thank you for your input! So, would you say you don't think she's a true dilute, and just expresses the black gene with a lighter shade?

I'm pretty confident she's a mackerel, but here's a side picture I freshly took!

Some things I find interesting are that, from the pictures of her maternal uncle as a youngster, he looks to be a Classic tabby, and he also seems much darker than he looks now. (The brown kitten in the pictures with their mom and the adult in the picture with the black kitten are the same cat!) And, his siblings look to be truly blue / dilute, one tabby and white and one solid blue and white. Which also leads to the fact that Storm's grandmother has white spotting - so I think it's safe to say that whoever her grandfather cat is, he had none.

 

[StefanZ]

tx for the pic. I deem her shorthair with lotsa kitten fuzziness. But occasionally they can be almost as changelings... So unswored is best.

Mackerel tabby dominates over classic tabby, so its fully possible a mackerel tabby has ALSO the gene for classic tabby...

 

[cataholic07]

Your kitty is a brown tabby domestic short hair mackerel and so cute. For sure shorthair as no ear fluff behind the ears and no really fluffy tail. All floofers go through a shorthair stage as kittens but generally will always have those characteristics, especially as a youngster.

(not a grey tabby, grey tabbies have grey markings only never black, brown tabbies can be both cool and warm toned.
Warm tones can appear orangish in coloring making some think they are torbies/calicos,
and cool tones appear more grey, especially as a kitten.
You can always tell a brown from a grey because of black markings and brown on the nose,
silvers have grey/black markings but white roots and no brown at all). (I hope mom and the others can be trapped and spayed/neutered).

 

[xenonentity]

cataholic07 Thank you!!

We have plans to get all of the ferals neutered when we can, hopefully even the grizzled old tom that occasionally visits. The babies will be easy - all of them are inside-only now, looking for new homes. The moms and uncle are fairly tame for ferals (semi-feral I guess?) and shouldn't be a problem. The grizzled old tom that hangs around sometimes may be more of a challenge, he's not very trustful, but I'm hoping we can get him too.

 

[Meowmee]

I would say a beautiful dsh silver mackerel tabby…but she has brown on her nose so maybe it is the light in the pics. The hair length can change overtime in the kitten though especially for long hair cats

As far as the genes for the color and pattern go, I am certainly no expert on that, but I would say she could have 1 colorpoint and one d I think because those are recessive… so, you don’t really know what she’s carrying based on what the mother and father have. And I think some of the others she could also have one as recessive.

For instance, two colorpoint cats will always have colorpoint kittens. There are no other possibilities as far as I know. But two cats who are not appearing to be color point could have a recessive gene and have colorpoint kittens.

There are all sorts of modifiers to some of these genes which decide both pattern and color too.