What percentage of orange tabby cats are female?

Ace a red tabby Maine Coon
Ace a red tabby Maine Coon. Photo copyright Helmi Flick
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About 25% of orange tabby cats are females, which means that 75% of orange tabby cats are males. I say that because sometimes internet users search for “What percentage of orange tabbies are male?”

Tabby cats are today’s topic so I thought I’d try and answer the question in the title to this post. Most orange tabbies are males and they tend to have a nice character. Please click the link below to read more.

Ginger Cat Personality

The rarer orange female tabbies tend to be “sassy” but that is anecdotal. People refer to orange tabbies as marmalade, yellow and red tabbies depending on their preference. ‘Red’ is probably the more accurate description. Read more on naming the coat by clicking on the link below.

Orange, red, yellow, ginger or marmalade cats

The reason why most orange tabby cats are male is because the gene responsible for the orange colour is sex-linked. The gene is carried on one of the sex chromosomes, the X chromosome. The recognised symbol for this gene is O. So, the X chromosome is responsible for the red tabby coat type. Female cats each have two X chromosomes. They need to inherit the O gene from both their parents to have a red tabby coat. Male cats have XY chromosomes and so they only need to have the O gene passed on through the X chromosome from their mother. This equates to a much higher chance of male cats being red tabbies compared to female cats.

The O gene eliminates all eumelanistic pigment, which is black, chocolate, blue – variations of black) from the hairs. Also, the O gene masks the non-agouti gene, which in simple language means ginger cats are tabby cats.

Robinson’s Genetics, the definitive book on cat genetics (and a horrible book to be honest), does not tell us in plain language what percentage of orange tabby cats are female neither does The Cat, Its Behavior, Nutrition & Health, a good reference book. The same goes for Legacy of the Cat and Home Owner’s Home Veterinary Handbook.

Big ginger tabby maine coon cat
Oscar Wilde. Red Tabby and White Maine Coon. Photo Barbara (Jorbasa on Flickr)

So, trawling the internet I have these figures:

  • 25%1
  • 25%2

I cannot find anything more definitive or certain. The general rule is that you are much more likely to see a male orange tabby cat than a female. As for calico cats (red, black and white) males are extremely rare.

Refs:

  1. Yahoo Answers
  2. Catster

Below are some more articles on red tabby cats.

Please search using the search box at the top of the site. You are bound to find what you are looking for.

72 thoughts on “What percentage of orange tabby cats are female?”

    • Thanks for visiting and asking Kristal.

      George has the appearance of a young Persian cat. He might be a Persian or a random bred cat who looks like a Persian. You’d probably know if he was a purebred Persian because there would be a pedigree (records). He is not Himalayan because they are pointed cats and George is not pointed.

      Hope this helps a bit.

      Reply
      • Thank you for your input. Here is a pic of him as he is today. I know the mother is Himalayan but never sen his father was told the father was Persian the owners said he looks like the father.

        Reply
        • Well there is the answer. There is a pedigree there: the parents are Persians. Remember the Himalayan is a Persian cat. It is just that the coat is pointed like a Siamese. The next question is whether the pedigree is good enough to describe George as purebred by American cat association standards.

          Reply
  1. This is Goldilocks female Maine coon she loves to play fetch an lovess attention her best friends are 3 yr an 1 yr olds such a great cat.

    Reply
  2. He seems to be between Sandy and red, he is a very special cat, I couldn’t ask for better. Yes people think he is “too pretty” to be a boy. It was nice having to wait years for all the lovely colour to come out, just gets better every day.

    Reply

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