Of course, cats don’t recognise the 21 different sexualities and gender identities that appear to be accepted nowadays. It is a different world to the way it was 10 years ago. I fully accept these identities and sexualities. I’ve always believed that there is a spectrum of feelings about one’s sexuality and gender. Although …
To fill out the question, it is asking if tortoiseshell cats can have some white fur in addition to the usual black plus orange tabby and the answer is yes but in the United States they refer to tortoiseshell cats with some white fur as ‘calico cats’. In the UK the cat fancy has …
To almost everyone except veterinarians, this is a very unusual cat photograph. It shows the closed mouth and the nose of a tortoiseshell cat with a tooth protruding from the upper jaw into the opening of the right nostril. And if you look to the right of the picture there appears to be two …
Male tortoiseshell cats are very rare because the genes which create the coat colour and pattern are sex linked. There should be no tortoiseshell male cats. There are some because of a minor genetic error which allows the male to develop with the combination XXY chromosomes. The double X gives it the chance to …
You will find various statistics on the rarity of tortoiseshell cats both in books and on the internet including in equally rare studies! The rarity factor varies as widely as 1 in 200 (Dr Desmond Morris in Cat World) to 1 in 400,000 by the Daily Mail! Where did they get that figure from? …
As you might well imagine, the reason why tortoiseshell cats are nearly always female is to do with the genetics and how the genes that dictate the coat colour and pattern are linked to the sex of the cat. Female mammals have 2 X chromosomes while males have one X and one Y chromosome. …
The unicorn of cats, so called, is a male tortoiseshell domestic cat. The title has been awarded because they are so rare. My research, years ago, indicated that about one in 3000 tortoiseshell cats are males. Dr. Desmond Morris in his book Cat World says that they are less rare at one in 200. …
Sometimes people do stereotype domestic cats based on the colour of their coats. Although this is a philosophical question there might be practical consequences. Three coat types come to mind immediately: black, ginger and tortoiseshell. We associate black with sinister behaviour and superstitions; ginger cats are stereotyped as of good character and tortoiseshell cats …
