Here’s the story. We had a cat we hadn’t gotten fixed yet…she was very young. So we were keeping her inside, but lust being what it is she slipped out at some point (and part of me has to admire her for that) and got knocked up. We found homes for her litter, except for the two we kept.
Who look nothing like each other. At all.
One is grey, and fluffy beyond all reason. I mean I’m serious, this level of fluffy should be illegal. His sister (and I did see them in the same litter) is black and sleek. Anti fluff.
To get to my GQ, my mother has opined that they have two different fathers. One litter, two Toms. Is that possible? Is it likely? Other explinations?
Well, since no one else answered I’ll give what information I know, though my cite isn’t the greatest. Cat litters, can indeed have more than one sire.
However, if both Ma and a single Tom were genetically mixed moggies, their kittens could display a wide range of different characteristics. Without a DNA test, you probably cannot tell.
My cat came from a litter of only three kittens. The mother cat was pure white with parti-coloured eyes. Both female cats were pure white with green eyes, the male kitten was jet black. The mother cat’s owner was convinced her cat had been shut in with two males and the colouring of the kittens had come from both of them.
What others have said. It’s possible that the babies have two different sires, but cat coat color genetics are complicated and not fully understood. If you had two adults with a sufficiently diverse array of genes, it wouldn’ t be difficult to get one baby that’s black and short coated, and another that is grey and long haired. What did the rest of the litter look like? And why haven’t you posted pictures yet? Didn’t you read the rules?
Yes it’s quite possible but the whole business of cat genetics and the way they pass on colourings etc means you could get all manner of colours from a litter even if you were absolutely sure who the parents are.
That’s why people who breed pedigree cats are so careful about where and how they keep their animals, and how they line up potential studs for the queens.
Hee hee. I’m thinking of getting a test and then combing the neighborhood for possible patriaches. We could get a court order that he has to come around with some dead rodents every month.
The funny thing is my prime suspect is an orange Tom who looks nothing like either one of them (to be more clear he looks like a Maine Coon while she looks like a Siamise dipped in tar).
I know they’re varity but this is so striking. If two fathers is a possiblity I think that’s what happened…that little slut
Sorry about the lack of pictures…I’m a bit technologicaly deficient at the moment. But if I can get one of the fuzzy one sprawled I’ll post it. Really, no one can sprawl like him.
As has been said two different fathers are a possibility, however as has also been stated cat coat genetics can be weird. It could be possibly that with the mother and only one father there could be recessive genes on both sides that when combined might produce the new coat color/length.
Even if they have two different fathers, there is no doubt they both came from the same mother, right? So, they are still siblings.
This one is less likely. Pure white ( in this case “dominant white”, given the parti-colored eyes of the mother ) and black can very easily show up in the same litter.
White cats are neat, genetically, insomuch as there are so many different ways to produce one - “dominant whites”, albinos ( two different types - blue-eyeds and pink-eyed, with the second recessive to the first, itself recessive to other “albino” expressions like pointing ), and heavily expressed piebald whites ( i.e. a HUGE white spot which essentially covers the entire cat ). One of several quick primers on white in cats floating out there:
Sorry, don’t have time at the moment to reproduce the research, but I looked this up for a friend last year. The answer is that cats have a special cycle wherein the female releases a new egg for each act of coitus. Thus, it’s not only possible for a litter to have multiple sires, it’s the norm (except in carefully regulated conditions). Factor in that each kitten gets a different subset of mom’s genes. Thus, wide diversity within a litter makes perfect sense.
Wait, does that mean that they are or that they are not superfecund (that is, a female may mate with more than one male when she is in heat, meaning different kittens in a litter may have different fathers.)?
[sub]:slinking away before this gets out of hand:[/sub]
Many years ago, friends who bred Siamese seal points insisted upon giving us a 9-month old female, even though we had a whole houseful of cats. She was beautiful, albeit noisy, so we could not resist.
Before we could get her spayed, she managed to sneak out and we saw her outside having relations with our big orange Tom. Not believing in coitus intruptus, we let them finish before we got her back inside. Too late.
She had a litter of six kittens, none of which showed any hint of Siamese or yellow stripes. They were black, white, plaid and, well, nondescript.
I guess the Siamese is a recessive trait. Anyway, we really were scraping by financially in those days, so instead of getting her fixed, we were able to give her away to another breeder before the cycle repeated.
Good luck trying to get a Q-Tip into the mouth of an unwilling tomcat. He’ll be busy taking DNA samples from you, and he’ll be getting a lot more than epithelials.
I’d be tempted to take a couple of slightly larger DNA samples - to ensure that there was no further possibilities of paternity.
