Calicos and Breeding

I have recently learned that almost all calicos are female. My stupid question of the day is: how does the female get pregnant with calico kittens if there is no male calico to impregnante her?

I am being nosey here...if Rocky and FLuffy were to have babies(which they can't because they are both fixed)..what would most of those babies look like..just go by looking at the pic...Rocky is the Tabby and Fluffy is the cow kitty...I alwaya wondered what they they would look like if they were to have babies.

Here's a good link about calicos and torties-

http://www.messybeast.com/tricolours.htm

Wow! with Rock & Fluff mated SHEEESH oh the variaties(sp?). of course black and whites and brown tabbys, brown tabby.white, black, brown tabby and white and it really depends if they have some dilute in there lines maybe a blue could appear

NO! Not all calicos are torties, some can be males, YOUR calico in U.S.A is Tortoishell Van and over here a calico is a bicolor kitty but you can still get tortie/white male cats!

Smiles Sam

Originally posted by Crazy-Cat-Lover
Say there was a female black and white cat that mated with an male orange cat. Most of the babies would come out Calico. If the mother was straight black, the babies would be tortoishells.

Click to expand...

Its not really thats simple, feline genetics are very complicated and while I dont know an awful lot about them I do have a color chart that tells me some things, lol. Depending on what a cat is "masking" you can get a number of things. For instance, a black x black doesnt just get you blacks, you can also get blues. A black to a red doesnt mean you will get torties. Here is what I know:

If you breed a black male to a red, cream, torti or blue cream female you can get a torti or blue cream, put white on one of the parents and you can get a - and white or calico.

If you breed a blue male to a red, cream, torti or blue cream female you can get blue creams from all and torties from red and torti. Again, add white if you want a calico.

IF you breed a red male to a black, blue, torti or blue cream female you can get torties and blue creams from all of the females.

If you breed a cream male to a black, blue, tortie or blue cream female you can get blue creams from all females and torties from the black and torti.

Now that I have typed blue so much the word has lost all meaning and is starting to look a little funny, lol. Hope this helps some.

My calico was adopted at a shelter, and she was the only calico in the litter. Her two sisters were black and white bi-color, and her brothers red tabbies. I assumed that her mother must have been black and white, and her father a red tabby. This theory was reinforced when she was 3 months old and my son recieved a pillow for his birthday. It was shaped like an animal, covered in black and white spotted faux fur, she immediately began to "nurse" on the pillow, and has done so every night for the past 3 years.

We call it her "stuffed mama".