inbreeding

What affect on a kitten developing FIP does inbreeding have?????

I am not sure I understand your question? Are you wanting to breed a kitten with FIP or are you wondering if inbreeding causes FIP?

Since some cats seem to be genetically predisposed for developing FIP inbreeding these cats would surely inhance the risk for the offspring to inherit that predisposition.

No I do not want to breed a kitten with FIP, I lost 2 sweet kittens to FIP, and found out that the breeder apparently inbred her cats, and I just wanted to know if that would have made the kittens I lost more proned to develope FIP.

I don't have an answer for you but wanted to say that I'm sorry you lost your sweet kittens

There's a new thought going around that some cats are genetically predisposed to developing FIP. Inbreeding itself would not cause FIP unless what they say about genetics are true, and the parents had the recessive gene. (Do a Google search for "FIP genetics".)

Personally, I had an inbred cat for 9 years that died rather mysteriously, but it definately was not from FIP.

However, I do know that cats that come from shelters and catteries are more likely to develop FIP. It's caused by a corona virus mutation, and it's thought that places (even homes) with mulitple cats pass around the viruses and therefore it puts them at more of a risk for it mutating. (I was told at the shelter that any place that has more than 6 cats is at a higher risk for FIP.)

Thank-you for this information. I will do the search.

inbreeding doubles up on the good genes as well as the bad. I don't know that FIP would be a genetic thing but your cats could have been weaker because of the inbreeding and therefore the virus mutated in them easier. I have read that purebred cats have more health problems because the genepool is smaller and outcrossing purebreds every once in a while will bring in new, healthy genes. It can definately make a cat unhealthy with too many of the same genes. Your cats probably were just unhealthy already (because of the inbreeding) and with the comprimised immune system they are more likely to develop other diseases.

Hi bengalbabe,
I went to your cattery site yesturday, and you have the most beautiful bengals, they look like baby leopards!!! I am in New Hampshire, and have not seen much of this breed here. Thank-you for responding to my question about inbreeding. I did try looking on line for genetic information, but was unsuccessful. I feel since I have been researching about FIP, I have found so many factors that affected the development on FIP for my sweet kittens. They were inbred, they were exposed to a carona virus in the cattery they were born, they were given expired vaccinations by the breeder, and the more I research, the more I find out. It's sad to think that a breeder could do this and deny it all and retire the parents and brother of my kitttens, and purchase a new male, and continue to breed and sell kittens without any reguard to what has happened to my kittens, or have any compassion for the grief myself and my family are experiencing. There are so many breeders out there, that I am learning are compassionate, and truely love their cats and kittens, but I happended to pick a lemon of a breeder.

Originally Posted by marlearn

Hi bengalbabe,
I went to your cattery site yesturday, and you have the most beautiful bengals, they look like baby leopards!!! I am in New Hampshire, and have not seen much of this breed here. Thank-you for responding to my question about inbreeding. I did try looking on line for genetic information, but was unsuccessful. I feel since I have been researching about FIP, I have found so many factors that affected the development on FIP for my sweet kittens. They were inbred, they were exposed to a carona virus in the cattery they were born, they were given expired vaccinations by the breeder, and the more I research, the more I find out. It's sad to think that a breeder could do this and deny it all and retire the parents and brother of my kitttens, and purchase a new male, and continue to breed and sell kittens without any reguard to what has happened to my kittens, or have any compassion for the grief myself and my family are experiencing. There are so many breeders out there, that I am learning are compassionate, and truely love their cats and kittens, but I happended to pick a lemon of a breeder.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately there are those out there that just want to make a quick buck. Since you were unable to find out about genetics let me explain it this way. All cats have 2 genes for each trait, one from mother and one from father. So let's say the the sire has some sort of deformity but because he has one good gene from one of his parents and one bad gene from the other he carries for the defect but he dosent show it because the good gene compensates for the bad one. Lets pretend his genes look like this: N for normal and d for defect so his set would be Nd. Ok so now you have a queen that has no defect and her genes look like this NN because she does not have the defect. Now each parent passes one gene onto thier offspring. So in a litter of 4 kittens the kittens genes will look like this: 2 with NN and two with Nd (so two that are normal and two who carry for the defect but appear normal)(or NN,NN,Nd,Nd).
Now here's where the inbreeding comes in- say you take one of those kittens whom carries for the defect (Nd) but you don't know they carry and breed it back to the father who carries (Nd) the defect. Now you remember that each trait contains two genes, one from the mother and one from the father. So now out of four kittens you get this:1 normal, 2 that carries but are normal,and one with the actual defect (or NN,Nd,Nd,dd). See how inbreeding can bring out defects in cats?
If you were to then even go further and take the one with the defect (maybe you don't know the cat has a defect because it shows itself later on) and breed it again back to the father or one of the sisters/brothers who carry the defect you would get this:1 carrying but normal,and three that have the defect or (Nd,dd,dd,dd)!
So is it worth it to inbreed? To me NO unless the breed is being established and there's no other way to bring out the traits that make a breed what it is. It is good to outcross with new blood every so often and then breed back the desired traits eventually.
Unfortunately many breeders inbreed too closely because they don't want to spend money on buying and maintaining another cat with different bloodlines, these kind of breeders do not know what thier cats carry and are doing it for the wrong reasons.
Other breeders do it to bring out a trait that is really desirable to the breed but if doing it for that reason (which is a legitimate reason) they need to be very careful that none of the cats used carry a genetic deformity. If any of them are found to carry a deformity they should not be bred AT ALL!
Cats that are inbred can have all kinds of immune system problems and therefore can surccomb to diseases that other cats may not catch.
If you ever buy another purebred ask to look at the cats pedigree to see if there is too many closely related cats on the pedigree. A breeder should not have a problem with showing you that info.

Just a note on the FIP situation-any cat with the corona virus will test positive with that virus and any cat that was vaccinated against FIP will test positive as well but only a small percentage with that virus actually get FIP. The breeder may not have known the cat had FIP or the virus could have mutated later after the cat left the breeders. So in that regard the breeder can't really be blamed. However, if she has a bunch of sick cats because of too much inbreeding, that would be her fault.

Hi Bengalbabe,
Thank-you for this information. This helps me understand so much better. I do have my kittens mom's pedagree, but not their dads, so I won't be able to do much more research on this, but it will help me for the future.
Thank-You,
Marlearn

Originally Posted by marlearn

Hi Bengalbabe,
Thank-you for this information. This helps me understand so much better. I do have my kittens mom's pedagree, but not their dads, so I won't be able to do much more research on this, but it will help me for the future.
Thank-You,
Marlearn

Click to expand...

Your welcome I was worried I was a little too long winded in that one but when I was trying to teach myself about genetics ( in an effort to be as responsible a breeder as possible) at first it was another language to me so I tried to explain it in easy terms. I will be very happy if this will help you in the future in making a descision on buying another cat. I wish you the best and hopefully you will get a great cat that will live a long healthy life!