Genetics: Make Me Orange!

So last time we learned that all cats are basically all black cats, but the interaction of other genes or gene modifiers change cats from basic black into the multitude of colours you see in the feline population.

The orange gene is the one I'm looking at today.

Cats carry the orange gene on their X chromosome, it's a sex linked gene.The presence of the gene masks a cat's black colouring -often called brown or seal in the cat fancy- and replaces it with orange, often called 'Red' in the cat fancy.

Boy cats have one X chromosome, from their mother, and one Y, from their father, and so can have one orange gene (from their mother) Boy cats can therefore either be black (in the absence of the orange gene) or orange (if it is present) but not both.

Girls, on the other hand, have two X chromosomes, one from their mother and one from their father, and so can have two, one or no orange making genes. If they have none, the cat will be a black cat. If they have two, the cat will be an orange cat. If they have the orange making gene on ONE chromosome only, and the other chromosome does not have it, then that's when you get a tortoiseshell cat.
Boy cats only have one X chromosome, remember, so can only have the orange making gene, or not have it, they cannot be tortie (but they will still have an underlying colour (brown etc) that they can pass on genetically- this one caught me out with our last litter!)  Girls can have the make me orange gene on one and not have it on the other. This is why all torties are female. Unless there's an underlying major chromosomal difference, such as an XXY cat... which is WAAAAAY beyond the scope of this blog!

None of my cats are orange or tortoiseshell. None of them have the make me orange gene. So it doesn't explain their colouration... we'll get onto that soon. Lisl and Lottie are torties though... because I mated my 'brown' (lilac!) cat Indigo with an 'orange' (apricot) cat Harry. And very beautiful they are too.

All About Hope

Originally posted on my private blog- posted to http://indikon-tonkinese.blogspot.com/ on 06/01/11

 

Today's post is about Miss Hope, because she's adorable. And not only is she adorable, she's got bucketloads of charm too. Some of the other kittens are naturally a bit shyer, and slower to show me their personalities (and in all fairness they are only just over 3 weeks old!) but Hope has personality coming out of her ears. And very lovely those ears are, too.

Hope is always amongst the first to greet me when I poke my head near to the nest, and will mew at me until I pick her up for a cuddle. She seems very curious about people and the big wide world in general. She's not the smallest kitten any more, her sister and one of her brothers are slightly lighter than she is.

May I draw your attention to that dear little cream stripe down her nose? The mottled cream blush on her whisker pads? The cream back foot next to the darker lilac one?

If she grows up to be half as beautiful as her lovely Mama, her family will be very lucky indeed!

The Name Game

Originally posted on my private blog- posted to http://indikon-tonkinese.blogspot.com/ on 06/01/11

I think it's about time the kittens had names. Really, it's as exciting as naming your own children!

Personally, I like to give cats human names, no Fluffys and Tiggers in my household! And I like them to be meaningful to me in some way. Ava and Sofia came to me at a rather dark time in my life, and their names reflect this- Ava is from the Hebrew chava, meaning life, and Sofia from the Greek sophos meaning wisdom. Positive, affirming names designed for moving on, which is something they helped me to do just by being their lovely selves.

Theo, from the Greek theos meaning god, was just a name I liked, but it seemed appropriate- not lacking in self esteem, this cat!

Now Indigo was going to be called Rose, but when I went to visit her for the first time, it didn't suit her AT ALL- she was far too naughty for a good-girl name like Rose! But I did want a colour name. So I umm-ed and ah-ed a little, and eventually came up with the rather more lively name Indigo- and before anyone tells me it's not a people name, I do know of a little girl named Indigo!

Naming litters is more complicated in a way, more names for one thing, and for another they are only temporary, as their families will no doubt choose for themselves a perfect name. But I simply cannot go through 13 weeks or more calling a kitten 'kitten'- they must have names. So I've decided with every litter I will pick a theme- whatever takes my fancy- and the kitten names will be around this theme.

I am a big fan of the group REM, and so this litter will be named after REM songs/ names used in REM songs and will be referred to from now on as the REM litter. Their pedigree names too will be based on these names.

So with no further ado, may I introduce you to kitten 2, now called Kensey.

Kensey is taken from the REM song Old Man Kensey, from their third studio album Fables of the Reconstruction, 1985.

Just to reiterate, if you've just signed up for a kitten, and you are reading this blog, do you have to keep the names I give the kittens? Not at all. Ava, Sofia and Indigo were named Lucie, Batman and Morris respectively. You can call your kitty anything you like :)

Morris? And Batman?? Yes, both Indigo and Sofia were thought to be boys at first! And a breeder friend of mine had to tell her twin kittens new owner that they were in fact two boys, not two girls as she had originally thought... fortunately she still wanted the kittens! I have a few names in reserve for if any of mine get a late visit from the kitten sex change fairy... small kittens are notoriously difficult to sex. At least when mine start getting their point colour it will be easier for me... all the girls will be tortoiseshell.

Who's The Daddy?

Originally posted on my private blog- posted to http://indikon-tonkinese.blogspot.com/ on 06/01/11

It's Harry!

Harry, or Grand Champion Fecheldee Harry, to give him his proper title, is apricot with a tonkinese (intermediete) coat. He's very handsome and cuddly with a lovely nature, and Indigo was quite happy in his company- even when she was hiding in his bed she didn't hiss or yowl at him, and- well obviously they got on a whole lot better than that after a day or two *grin*

Apricot is a colour we haven't covered yet, genetically speaking, but it's red (orange), diluted to cream and caramelised to apricot. You'll have to take my word for that for the moment! We'll cover dilution and caramel eventually on here.

Which means there are eight possibilities, kitten- wise. These are:

Female, lilac tortie, tonkinese coat
Female, lilac tortie, solid coat
Female, (lilac-based) caramel tortie, tonkinese coat
Female, (lilac-based) caramel tortie, solid coat
Male, lilac, tonkinese coat
Male, lilac, solid coat
Male, (lilac-based) caramel, tonkinese coat
Male, (lilac based) caramel, solid coat

They all have an equal likelihood, so a 1 in 8 chance. Of course this is an average, so we might get two of one, none of another... it's the luck of the draw. And it may be many weeks- months in the case of the caramels, before their colouration becomes apparent. It will be interesting to see what we do get.

Update 06/01/11 Ha ha! I got my genetics wrong, and instead of a litter of lilacs, we have a litter of blues! This is because although Dad cat is cream, he also has the underlying colour the cream masks, (blue, in Harry's case), and has passed that onto his kittens of course! I'd totally overlooked that. I do feel a bit of a prune!