Question about calicoes

kittymonsters · Mar 26, 2007

Originally Posted by GoldenKitty45

If you kitty only has color on the tail and head it would be known as a "calico van"

Van patterned cats have color on the head, tail and maybe 1-2 body spots - ideal van is head/tail only

That is my Izzy, a bad calico van ( too many body spots, 3 big ones) or a bad calico....not enough spots,

goldenkitty45 · Mar 26, 2007

Hmmm I think I'd call her calico simply cause the body spot is pretty big

Usually the van's might have a few spots on the body but they are not very big.

Here's a nice description of bicolor vs van colored (to make it more confusing)

http://www.showcatsonline.com/x/what_is_a_van.htm

Another with some very lovely bicolors and vans

http://www.geocities.com/lovemaniapersians/mainpage.htm

kittydad · Mar 26, 2007

OK, so I know I have 2 calico cats, where does the tiger part come from? I am trying to wrap my little pea of a brain around this, nad it will take a bit to get it right.

kittymonsters · Mar 26, 2007

Ok, if you look at your girls' forheads can you see the faint "M" marking? and the "eyeliner" those are part of the Tabby pattern markings. Some Calico cats have the gene for the tabby pattern, so their colored spots will have darker lines or strips in them. Others like my Izzy don't have the stripping pattern in their colored spots, thus no Tabby pattern.

This photo shows a good head shot of a calico cat that doesn't have tabby in her markings
http://www.acclaimimages.com/_galler...1910-3517.html

She is also a Dilute or muted calico, because she is grey, white and peach.

goldenkitty45 · Mar 27, 2007

- sometimes I have to chuckle on descriptions....correct terms for dilute calico are blue, cream, and white....

xxtashaxx · Mar 27, 2007

this has been an intresting read as im still not 100% what chloe is lol. iv been told different.
first calico.
then tortie and white.
and then something else which i can not remember lol heres some pics. thought i would make this thread a bit more confusing more then it already is lol

scamperfarms · Mar 27, 2007

she looks like a pretty calico to me.

goldenkitty45 · Mar 27, 2007

lol - more confusion. I would call her tortie and white rather then a calico, cause she's got more color then white.

Usually a calico has more white on the back with spots of black/red. Her white looks like its confined to face, tummy and legs only - not the back.

She is adorable

xxtashaxx · Mar 27, 2007

your right , she is has white on her face front and back legs and tummy , with a very tiny light patch of orange on her leg and belly like pea sized she has no white on her back atall , this is where people have been a bit muddled. all her front and sides point to a calico but her back point to a tortie.

laureen227 · Mar 27, 2007

best links i have for explaining cat coloration...
torties, calicos & tricolor cats
tabbies
bicolors
selfs
pointed/masked
another on tabbies
smoked/shaded/tipped
many of these are from the messy beast archives, a great place for all kinds of cat info!

twstychik · Mar 28, 2007

I've always thought that any significant ammoutn of white made a cat a calico and that very little to no white meant a tortie or torbie. I've always called my Frankie a calico because she has a good ammount of white on her but it's mostly on her underside and over her shoulders.

goldenkitty45 · Mar 28, 2007

If you think of it as a white cat (like yours) that has spots of black/red - you have a calico

epona · Mar 28, 2007

Originally Posted by XxtashaxX

this has been an intresting read as im still not 100% what chloe is lol. iv been told different.
first calico.
then tortie and white.
and then something else which i can not remember lol heres some pics. thought i would make this thread a bit more confusing more then it already is lol

I am going to confuse the issue all the more! The term 'Calico' is a US term, not a UK term, we don't 'officially' use the word calico.

What an American would call a Calico, we call a Tortie & White.

And yes, what an American would call a Tortie & White, we would also call a Tortie & White.

We use the same term to describe any cat with black, orange, and white anywhere on its body whether in spots or brindled.

abymummy · Mar 28, 2007

Here's a simple explanation of a calico as given to me by a cat show Judge:

Imagine a white cat that was splashed with red and black paint from the top. That's a calico.

In other words, only the top parts of the cat should be black and red with or without white, not the bottom part!

epona · Mar 28, 2007

I forgot to say in my previous post that there's an interesting and nowadays somewhat obscure historical reason for why we don't use the word Calico.

It used to be a derogatory slang term for women of what we would now term the 'nouveau riche', or women of a lower social status trying to act and dress posh, dating from the days when machine-printed fabrics were first available. Wealthy women from the upper classes would wear hand painted or hand embroidered silks, and aspirational women of lower social classes would wear the cheaper machine printed fabric which was called calico - hence these women were dubbed 'Calicos'. Think of Hyacinth Bucket but transported back in time a couple of centuries. It was quite an insult to be called a Calico.

dragoriana · Mar 28, 2007

So im correct in saying Jazzy is a calico with tabby markings. My god i didnt realise how many different variations of the tri-colour kitties there were!

those dark stripes are present through all the orange patches on her body

mostly white tummy/legs/face

i wont post too many pics, but youve seen in other threads she has just big lumps of orange and black

laureen227 · Mar 28, 2007

Originally Posted by Dragoriana

So im correct in saying Jazzy is a calico with tabby markings. My god i didnt realise how many different variations of the tri-colour kitties there were!

those dark stripes are present through all the orange patches on her body

i wont post too many pics, but youve seen in other threads she has just big lumps of orange and black

yep, she's like my Java. most red/orange cats have tabby lines, even the ones that are supposed to be solid red... theirs are just fainter & fewer.

goldenkitty45 · Mar 28, 2007

If the striping is only in the red and not the other color, she would be a calico - not a tabby calico. Almost all red shows stripes. A TORBIE is a tabby cat (brown, silver, blue) that also has red mixed in with the base color.

duchess15 · Mar 28, 2007

Wow....I didn't realize that there were so many versions of calico/tortie/tabby! I'm guessing that Lexi is a pure calico? Am I correct? She is in my signature, but if you need a different angled picture, let me know.

goldenkitty45 · Mar 28, 2007

She looks more like a typical calico to me

Question about calicoes

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