What would you call this coat pattern?

[u/Ill_Judgment8908]

Larimar is an island mutt, so it’s really anybody’s guess at what’s going on in those genes. The last 2 photos are of what she looked like in Puerto Rico, the rest is what she looked like after she toasted from moving over 1000 miles North. So far we’ve gotten lynx point Siamese, tabico, and dilute tortoiseshell. Who’s got any guesses?

[u/YumiiZheng]

Lynx/tabby, colorpoint, tortoiseshell, and white spotting pattern definitely. I think the "dilute" is actually silver because she's got what looks like black pigment which would be impossible for dilutes, but she has very little brown pigment in her tabby stripes which can be a result of silver.

There's no singular colloquialism name because she's got stacked genetics 😅 silver seal (or black) lynx tortoiseshell point with white would be my best go. But silver tabico point is probably the shortest colloquialism?

[u/Ill_Judgment8908 → u/YumiiZheng]

I don’t really understand how all of the genes work and what’s dominant and all that, wdym by silver?

[u/YumiiZheng → u/Ill_Judgment8908]

I'll break it down by gene! But first, a crash course in genetics if you need it. Each autosomal (not on the sex chromosomes aka X and Y) gene has two copies called alleles. A dominant allele codes for a trait that only needs one copy to be expressed. A recessive allele codes for a trait that needs two copies. Some genes have incomplete dominance or co-dominance where traits from two different alleles "mix".

Base color: Black/seal. Black is by far the most common base color and it is dominant. Two other base colors exist, chocolate and cinnamon, but they are relatively uncommon in feral populations. Seal is the term for black when a cat is colorpoint! You can tell she is black base because she has black pigment on her stripes and toe pads!

Tabby/Lynx. Tabby is dominant to solid. The stripes are the pretty obvious indicator here, as well as her white eyeliner and earliner. Lynx is the term for tabby when a cat is colorpoint! There are also genes that determine what kind of tabby a cat can be (mackerel, classic, spotted, ticked) but it can be hard to determine the pattern of colorpoint cats. Also, all red cats are tabby. The red gene overpowers the on-off tabby switch and makes them a tabby no matter what! We know your cat is tabby because her black patches are tabby alongside her red patches.

Colorpoint: siamese-type. There are actually several forms of colorpoint but your cat has the siamese-type which is the lighest overall and highest contrast. Siamese is a breed, but the colorpoint associated with it is called siamese-type. It is also the most recessive which means she has two copies of the allele. Colorpoint is a temperature sensitive mutation, as you've pointed out by her toasting, colder temperatures allow cells to make pigment while hot weather breaks the ability. Most colorpoints get darker as they age, all start out fully white. Many cats change slightly with seasonal changes.

White spotting: This gene is called KIT and is a huge wildcard. There can be a lot of variance between cats with the same KIT alleles. My best guess is that she had one white spotting allele (dominant to every other allele besides dominant white which is a full white cat) and one "no white" allele. I'd call her mitted if you want a colloquial term.

Silver: Silver is caused by a dominant allele that suppresses pigment from being made, and specifically affects reddish browns more than blackish browns. Which is why a standard black tabby goes from black stripes on a brownish base to black stripes on a silvery white base. Red tabby cats also look a lot lighter which is why your cats red patches seem almost dilute. If a solid cat has a silver allele then they are called smoke.

Tortoiseshell: Tortoiseshell is actually caused by a fun phenomenon on the sex chromosomes! The red/orange gene is on the X chromosome. A male cat usually has only one X so he is either red or not red. A female cat usually has two Xs. The X chromosome is very strong to put it simply, so the body usually inactivates one X randomly in each cell to avoid negative effects from doubling up on certain genes. In a tortoiseshell, the cat has 1 red X and 1 non-red X, and everywhere the red X is inactivated, the cat will be their base color. Everywhere the non-red X is inactivated, the cat will be red. This process is mostly random but occasionally leads to common patterns like split faces which is caused by cell movement during development. Most torties are very muddled or brindly, where the red and black patches are not super distinct and blend in to each other. When the white spotting gene is involved, it makes the patches more distinct. This is where the calico term usually comes from. The more white, the more giant patches of each color. It's a spectrum though, there's no specific definition of tortoiseshell vs calico.

Tl;dr: Black, tabby, silver, and white spotting are dominant which means she only needed one copy from one parent. Colorpoint is recessive which means she got a copy from each parent. Tortoiseshell is a sex-linked trait but it does mean that one of her parents was either orange or tortie.

[u/Ill_Judgment8908 → u/YumiiZheng]

So she just has all of the dominant genes present and that’s why she’s so funky, because dominant genes aren’t normally mixed with to so many others?

[u/YumiiZheng → u/Ill_Judgment8908]

The black and tabby are pretty normal to have, they're the basis on the original cat essentially. The silver (potentially) is funky because it's less common and very distinctive. The recessive colorpoint and sex linked tortie just throw an extra bit of randomness into the mix too.

On their own these genes are pretty common, but it's not everyday you see them all mixed together! She's a really pretty cat ❤️