“Most orange cats are boys, a quirk of feline genetics that also explains why almost all calicos and tortoiseshells are girls.” I had no idea… 🧪 www.science.org/content/arti... - ThreadSky

kakape.bsky.social • 88 days ago

“Most orange cats are boys, a quirk of feline genetics that also explains why almost all calicos and tortoiseshells are girls.”
I had no idea… 🧪

https://www.science.org/content/article/gene-behind-orange-fur-cats-found-last

Comments

fayemcqueen.bsky.social•87 days ago

But does it explain why Orange cats are the stupidest?

icondaemon.bsky.social•87 days ago

Zest begs to differ.

marksmit.bsky.social•87 days ago

We have a rare female ginger ninja 🥷

ankleen.bsky.social•87 days ago

Esther is taking offense. She's a very smart girl - she just likes paper bags.

alderson.bsky.social•87 days ago

Does this also explain the single-shared-brain for all gingers?

baybdoll.bsky.social•87 days ago

Meet our little Greta. She looks quite sweet in the pics but your post made me wonder if her daily psycho, not typical kitty antics are from her rarity 🤷‍♂️

multiverseandy.bsky.social•25 days ago

Precious. All gingers are maniacs.

car37lon2cas.bsky.social•87 days ago

I knew a ginger Tom once. Lovely chap, but always ate with his mouth open.

adrianaincanada.bsky.social•88 days ago

But does it explain their behaviors?

jung-gt.bsky.social•87 days ago

I knew about tortoiseshell and calico cats being almost exclusively female, but had not thought about the corollary that orange cats are more likely to be male. Interesting that deletion of a regulatory DNA element causes overexpression of a gene and orange fur.

infinitywaltz.bsky.social•88 days ago

Th orange thing is a bit overstated; it's like three out of four or something like that, so it's not like orange females are rare given the total number of cats in the world, but calico and tortoiseshell males really are rare enough to be newsworthy.

kakape.bsky.social•88 days ago

I assume that’s why it says “most” for orange and “almost all” for calico and tortoiseshell. I just had never heard of this before. (And some people used to call me Garfield so I should know…)

infinitywaltz.bsky.social•87 days ago

Yeah, I just make the point because I shared this information with The Misses as a fun fact, and then for the next six months we met an average of one orange female cat per day, and each time she'd look at me wide-eyed and say, "But they're so RARE" in an extremely sarcastic tone of voice.

kakape.bsky.social•87 days ago

😂

thelittlepakeha.net•87 days ago

there are two orange cats that visit my yard, one is definitely male but I'm fairly sure the other is female (she's quite a bit more shy so it will probably be a long while until I can confirm!)

ssnaushon.bsky.social•88 days ago

doclt.bsky.social•87 days ago

The genes for “dark area” color in cats are on the x chromosome. Males have only one X chromosome, so are either black or orange with only one color gene. Females have two X chromosomes and if the color jeans are different, their colors are a mosaic of which X-chromosome was inactivated at that spot

doclt.bsky.social•87 days ago

Intensity of color gene is at another location, whose actual name is “dilute”. The genes in this location, make the difference between a black cat and a gray cat, or an orange cat and a cream cat.

doclt.bsky.social•87 days ago

So what is new in this research is that a mutation in the regulation of a gene rather than the gene itself is what causes orange color in cats. This apparently has not been observed another animals animals

a2t8.bsky.social•88 days ago

Does something like this apply to humans as well? Like all orange Trumps are moronic sociopaths?

gertrudemiller.bsky.social•87 days ago

Judging by observation of offspring, it may not be limited to just orange ones.

a2t8.bsky.social•87 days ago

Agreed, it’s the whole awful species

Comments

Posting Rules

Reply