Scout

9 weeks old


12 weeks old


13 weeks old


13 weeks old

This is little Scout. He's only 14 weeks old. I've had him since he was about 8 weeks, and his coat has definitely changed. Scout used to be much lighter in color, almost white. He has gradually become more yellow/orange color, along with some slight stripes. I got him from a friend's farm, and I saw his dad (or uncle? I know it was one of his relatives) which looks a lot like him. The relative was very yellowish and had crazy amber-orange eyes. I'm suspecting this is what Scout will look like when he is full grown. He's definitely short hair and is pretty vocal already. I've never seen a cat like him, and I was wondering what on earth breed he is. All I know is that he's growing up so fast and it's breaking momma's heart! 

Welcome to TCS. I am thinking his coloring is dilute red tabby. His breed is Domestic Shorthair, also known lovingly as a moggie.

 Color / Pattern is Cream Mackerel Tabby .   Catspaw is correct ,   he is the dilute version of Red Tabby, which are the brighter orange ones.  The Cream ones are less common because it requires inheriting  a recessive Dilute gene from both parents. 

Cats are not usually a breed or mix of breed like dogs.   There has been far less human control of cats' breeding than there has with dogs.  The vast majority of cats have just bred randomly on their own  and their ancestors would be mostly or entirely other random-breeding cats from the same part of the world.   And that's probably what Scout is - - that would be true of most farm cats.  These random bred cats are known as Domestic Shorthair or Domestic Longhair  which just means no particular breed / unknown ancestry. 

It's these cats that one way or another,  the breeds came from.   For example,  the American Shorthair is a pedigreed breed that was originally started from  shorthaired  farm cats of the U.S.A.

 There's also been some mixing from the pedigreed cats back into the general cat population  but  with all the pedigreed cats together only being about 3% of owned cats,  and most these days altered as kittens,    most cats are not likely to have recent pedigreed ancestors.   And usually it's not even possible to tell if a cat has a bit of a certain breed,   especially with breeds that are not extreme in their shape or with rare colors. 

Scout doesn't really strongly resemble any specific breed and chances  are he's not  .  

 Right now he has big ears for his size,  but that might just be a kitten phase and he will grow into the ears.    

He is a very handsome kitten,  and it does look like he's on the way to getting some beautiful gold eyes!   I bet he will be stunning!