Another Shelter Kitty - Any ideas what type of cat he is?

[shelterhelper]

I wrote a week ago about our two shelter kitties and inquired about what type of cats they are.

Thanks for everyone's input.  I'm trying to get all our shelter kitties listed on the Petfinder.com site and another lady is putting them on our Facebook page.  Due to our Humane Society Director's poor health, we need to find homes or no-kill shelters for our 17 cats very soon or they will be handed over to a "kill" shelter. 

Whiskers #2.jpg

• shelterhelper
• Mar 27, 2013

Whiskers.JPG

• shelterhelper
• Mar 27, 2013

Smudge, Whiskers-Buddies.JPG

• shelterhelper
• Mar 27, 2013

His body is the coloring of a Siamese.  He has a black tail, white paws and blue eyes.  His face markings appear to be tabby.  Do you think he is a Siamese/Tabby mix?  Would I be accurate to use a description like that?

Thanks again for any ideas you have.  You have a very nice site here.

 

[StefanZ]

The pattern is a tabby point, in some associations called for Lynx point.

(I suppose they mean the Lynx cat is supposed to be tabby-patterned - sometimes they are.)

So, he is a point, but the masque is tabby-patterned, that is why we dont see any masque, so to speak. "we dont see the forest because of the trees" The black tail and blue eyes are revealing him.

Nice and swell, but tells it us something about his breed?  Not really.  It only tells us he has two genes for point...  They are recessive, so a cat can be a carrier and looks whatever.  Say, two whatever cats , lets say Russian blues, both carriers, do mate. In the litter may now be born one or two pointed cats. They will look like an oldy type siamese...   This happens now and then.

The gene is recessive, but doubled up in one individ this gene is very strong, and gives the outer appearance of that individ.

These russians have the body and head type of old type siamese, as they have such ancestors 20 generations ago. Our hero here  Head and body dont remind me of any breed save a typical moggie... The socks??  I suppose one of them was a Ragdoll or a Birman, both can have socks.

So, like with our smoked friends, just use this fancy pattern name, so you arent lying but still can attract interested adopters/buyers.  Lynx point and explain it is really a tabby point.

Good luck!

 

[maewkaew]

*Technically* you would not be lying to call the handsome young fellow a DSH x Siamese mix and if it's a matter of saving his life, I would do it . I don't see anything about him that makes me think he has a large amount of Siamese . But hey, 99.9999% DSH and 0.0001% Siamese could be argued to be technically a Siamese mix., in the sense that there is a drop of Siamese in the mix. and so would 94.9999% DSH, 5% Ragdoll and 0.0001% Siamese ( to give another possibility)

Stefan is right that a pointed pattern tells you a cat has 2 copies of the pointed gene (allele) but it doesn't tell that a cat is a particular breed. However, this pattern is one of a very few colors or patterns that strongly suggest some ancestors of a certain breed. It doesn't tell you how recent those ancestors were; they may have been 60 or more years ago. But he almost certainly had some Siamese ancestors on both sides, since that is where the pattern originally came from. Then over the past 100+ years, in countries to which Siamese cats were imported, the gene for this pattern has been widely spread through the random-bred cat populations by Siamese cats, cats of other breeds who somehow got the pattern from Siamese, and mixes / moggies who are either pointed or carrying one copy of the pointed gene.

His pattern is Seal Lynx Point and White (that's if the darkest fur is black or very very very dark brown; but just in case I'm seeing it wrong and the darkest fur is really dark grey , that would be Blue Lynx Point and White. Another way to describe it is to say "Mitted" instead of "and White"

I hope you're able to get the cats placed. In fact you might evven try Siamese Rescue for this boy. t hey take just about any sort of pointed cats.

 

[orientalslave]

We in the UK would call him a seal tabby-point & white, or seal tabby-point bicolour.  He is lovely, somewhere probably way back a pointed pedigree has spread (probably) his genes in the local domestics.  However it could be a Persian (Himalayan), Birman, Ragdoll, BSH or any other pointed breed....

The tip of his tail looks black so I go with seal-point.

 

[shelterhelper]

Thank you for your information, and I will definitely use it to describe this sweet little guy.

We have used a Siamese rescue in Denver once in the past.  It's over 400 miles from us, but another shelter volunteer has family there.  I know if they would accept him (and the kitty I just posted about), we could get them there.

Regarding my first post about the "smoke" kitties, I have Googled "oriental short hair rescues".  Unfortunately, the nearest one is 400 miles away in Canada.  If the Siamese rescue is receptive, I will try to approach them.  I think I will defintely send them a link to your post about them.  It might, as you suggested, make them interested.

I appreciate all your help, everyone.  I'm hoping, once this crisis is over, to explore the whole website more thoroughly.  I have cats myself (both shelter cats) and would like to explore your information.  I would love to take all our shelter kitties myself, but my husband would put all of us out the door. 

 

 

[maewkaew]

He looks seal to me too , but I mentioned the other possibility just in case the photos are deceptive; I cluelessly missed that the OP SAID his tail was black! So yes he is obviously Seal Tabby Point and White ( or Seal Lynx Point and White if the shelter wants to use that , since that is commonly used in North America.) The CFA and and the CCA/AFC use "Lynx Point" . TICA would like to be more international and would rather people change to Tabby Point. but some North American breeders are attached to lynx point. So TICA use BOTH! They write "lynx (tabby) point" .lol.
I myself would call the cat a Seal Tabby Point & White Domestic Shorthair since DSH just means no particular breed / ancestry unknown. and there is not really a reason to think he has a large amount of some breed. BUT I still understand why SH wants to find any reason to call him partly some breed if it will avoid this shy boy going to a kill shelter.

The reason I think they could technically get away with "Siamese mix" (though yeah, it's a stretch ) is that that's where the pointed allele most logically would have come from in all those other breeds. What is not known is the route the genes took to get to this particular pointed DSH, and it is possible there could have been ancestor(s) of some other breed between the Siamese and the moggies who were probably the immediate ancestors. But that would be a total wild guess . It is at least very very very likely that there was a Siamese back there somewhere. They could use "DSH - Siamese mix" .

******************** Shelter Helper, I SERIOUSLY would see if you could get a Siamese Rescue group to take the little guy. I know for a fact they take some cats with tabby points and white patches. Most of the cats in Siamese Rescue gruops are not pure Siamese. a few are Siamese , some are mixes that have definite traits of Siamese besides a pointed pattern ( and the blue eyes that always go with the pattern). but others are probably almost entirely moggy , but with a pointed pattern.

That might get one cat safe. then if you have chances for some places in a general no-kill shelter or rescue group , they could go to other cats that don't show ANY sign of any breed. (I guess his friend is Brown Tabby and White? looks like gold eyes. But they look similar... are they siblings? If they are closely bonded I would at least mention that if you contact Siamese rescues -- you MIGHT even be able to get them both in.) Here is the main site for a network of Siamese Rescues in the U.S. I have adopted cats from them, they really help a lot of cats, they have a lot of volunteer fosters and transporters as well as a couple actual shelter locations. http://www.siameserescue.org/Here is another one in NYC http://www11.brinkster.com/nycsiamese/

 

[shelterhelper]

Thank you to everyone who replied to my post.

Maewkaew, I went to the website at the bottom of your post.  I found that the Rocky Mountain Siamese Rescue we used before (in Denver) is affiliated with the site you suggested, "siameserescue.org".  I'm going to email them pictures of the four kitties I asked about here and explain the dangerous situation they are in.  I hope they will help us.  I don't know if they will be interested in the two black "smoke" kitties, but it will be worth a try.

Also, you mentioned our little guy's "buddy".  The other kitty grew up with him, they are about the same age but they are not related.  She is a gray and white tabby with gold eyes.  We would love to have them stay together.  It's odd how similar the two look in that photo.  Normally, they don't look that much alike.

I appreciate the help you've given.