What exactly is a Siamese?

[ezrafitch]

My girlfriend and I went to a ladys house who i heard was giving away kittens. My gf really wanted one so went with the "siamese" now i never saw the mother or the father only the bros and sis lol there was a black a gray brownish and a couple i forget. Does she have a Siamese? I dont know a whole lot about cats i only love them lol I always thought a certain breed would have to be born from the same type of breed.

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• ezrafitch
• Mar 5, 2014

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• ezrafitch
• Mar 5, 2014

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• ezrafitch
• Mar 5, 2014

image.jpg

• ezrafitch
• Mar 5, 2014

The second picture is from the first day.

 

[GemsGem]

She is a little cutie

You are right to be a Siamese she would have to have Siamese parents. It's possible one of her parents was a Siamese and the other one wasn't. But this would mean she would still only be half Siamese ( cross breed )

You said that of the other kittens one was black and one was grey/brown colour. This proves that one of the parents was not a Siamese. If both parent had been Siamese all the kittens would have looked like Siamese with a pointed pattern like your little girl - basically all the kittens would have looked pretty much identical to yours.

You could call her a Siamese cross breed if you wish. She does have a pointed pattern like Siamese and she has a pointy muzzle like them too.

 

[StefanZ]

Yes, this gorgious  kitten has the looks of a really decent siamese old type.  !"The fenotype of a siamese old type", as one new forumist from Russia would put it.

As the siblings were visibly not siameses, at least one parent is no siamese.   Actually, none of parent need to be hardly any siamese at all.  My guess both are "common moggies" as the owner gave the kittens away for free.   If they were real siames mixes, she would probably take some payment.  Not because to safeguard they got good homes, but because there is a market for real mixes from a real pure breed.

The siamese look alike has a interesting genetical twist.  The look is caused by one  single gene!   The point gene is recessive, so if it is alone in the pair, it is never or seldom visible in the cat.   And the cat can have ANY looks.  It may be a Russian blue, it may be a moggie, it can be almost whatever...

But if this gene doubles, comes both from mom and from dad - voilá!  We get our pointed cat.,   Doubled up point gene is very strong, and gives almost the whole outer appearance of a cat, including blue eyes.

Such is not entirely unusual amongs the mentioned   russian blues, as some blue pointed siameses were used in the RB breeding programmes back in the late 1940:ies and early 1950....

Here, as the muzzle is rather pointed, it is my (and Gemsgems) guess the siamese ancestry  is fairly recently, in at least one of the parents.

Although my guess is none of the parents were siamese.  If both are non siamese carriers, it will be typically one kitten in a litter of four, who is a point. the others are non points.

Carrier x siamese, gives half of the kittens are points, the rest are carriers.

I hope you understood what I wrote in my bad english.  

Good luck!

 

[ezrafitch]

Thanks! So i did a little bit more digging and I found out from the previews owner that the mother looked just like our kitten. She dosn't know the difference between cats just that they come in different colors and kill mice.