How common are male calicos? I had always thought that it was a genetic anomaly that is very rare but it seems like I have heard of one here and there, more often than very rare.
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Male Calicos
- Thread starter denice
- Start Date
I was going to ask the same thing about tortoiseshell cats (the same situation).
I have only known of one male calico, owned by a friend. That was back in 1978. I have either owned or encountered dozens of cats since then. All the calicos and torties were female....
The info I can find says 1 in 3000 calicos/torties are male. All I really know is I have never met one :tongue2:.
- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #5
I remember we used to have a former breeder here, she used to breed Cornish Rex. She knew of a male calico that wasn't sterile. I know that has to be really rare. I don't remember now what color it was but she said he only threw one color rather than both.
Here's some links that explain it
www.messybeast.com/quickfacts.htm
www.messybeast.com/mosaicism.htm
www.messybeast.com/quickfacts.htm
www.messybeast.com/mosaicism.htm
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- #7
So the way I understood that article a male calico that is fertile doesn't have the XXY genetics. I don't remember which color Goldenkitty said that he passed on but it was always just one and never the other one.
When Angelina came up to our porch and joined our family, we thought she was pregnant with two kittens. So did the vets.
Then, all of a sudden, there were no kittens, and the vets could not explain it.
She did not miscarry. Once she came into our house, she was in our house to STAY. For at least two full weeks after she joined our family, she would go to the front door and look out longingly. I encouraged her to go out. It was okay, she could always come back in. But NO WAY. She turned, ran and hid under the bed. I think she thought that the rug was going to be pulled out from under her again, and she wasn't going to let that happen.
I would love to have had her kittens, but oh well. 'T'was not meant to be...
Then, all of a sudden, there were no kittens, and the vets could not explain it.
She did not miscarry. Once she came into our house, she was in our house to STAY. For at least two full weeks after she joined our family, she would go to the front door and look out longingly. I encouraged her to go out. It was okay, she could always come back in. But NO WAY. She turned, ran and hid under the bed. I think she thought that the rug was going to be pulled out from under her again, and she wasn't going to let that happen.
I would love to have had her kittens, but oh well. 'T'was not meant to be...
Angelina is a tortoise / calico? My guess is she absorbed them foetuses inside her. Happens sometimes.
Or, she DID miscarry, and ate up everything. No traces left, perhaps just a wet mark if you look closely. Such happens. A very useful trick in the wild, to avoid predators.
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We had a male calico in our neighborhood back in the 80s. My sister has a dilute tortoiseshell male. Both were/are castrated, so there's no way of knowing about sterility.
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Howdy ho Cat Lovers,
Male calicos are actually fairly common. I get a call about one every few months. Often they are noticed at spay / neuter clinics as the vet goes to do a spay and woops - need to neuter. Male calicos can have different genetic causes, the one mostly commonly documented is a "chimera". A chimera is usually a very early fusion of two fertilized eggs (embryos or zygotes) - making one individual. When the embryos are a different gender - female (XX) and male (XY), then the resulting cat will have some tissues that are XX, some that may be XY, and some tissues may have both XX/XY. How extensive the chimerisms depends on when the zygotes fused - when in development. Now also, this fusion has to be in a cat where one of the parents transmitted an X chromosome that has the orange mutation and the fusion had to be between embryos of different sexes! This is when we actually "see" the cat is a chimera as it will be a tortie and a male. Often the male is sterile because of having XX and XY chromosomes - confusing the normal development of the testis and ovaries. Thus, there could be even more "chimera" cats, but we do not recognize them because they do not have an usual coat color, especially not a tortie male. Other chromosomal abnormalities can occurr too - such as translocations of past of the X chromosome onto one of the other chromosomes - this is more rare.
Male calicos are actually fairly common. I get a call about one every few months. Often they are noticed at spay / neuter clinics as the vet goes to do a spay and woops - need to neuter. Male calicos can have different genetic causes, the one mostly commonly documented is a "chimera". A chimera is usually a very early fusion of two fertilized eggs (embryos or zygotes) - making one individual. When the embryos are a different gender - female (XX) and male (XY), then the resulting cat will have some tissues that are XX, some that may be XY, and some tissues may have both XX/XY. How extensive the chimerisms depends on when the zygotes fused - when in development. Now also, this fusion has to be in a cat where one of the parents transmitted an X chromosome that has the orange mutation and the fusion had to be between embryos of different sexes! This is when we actually "see" the cat is a chimera as it will be a tortie and a male. Often the male is sterile because of having XX and XY chromosomes - confusing the normal development of the testis and ovaries. Thus, there could be even more "chimera" cats, but we do not recognize them because they do not have an usual coat color, especially not a tortie male. Other chromosomal abnormalities can occurr too - such as translocations of past of the X chromosome onto one of the other chromosomes - this is more rare.
