Of course, both of them have had kittens (not my fault!).īriony, the one in the middle, is a riot. My orange female cats are more playful than my orange male cats. :Dĭo you guys find that male cat are more social, playful, and silly than female cats? I have had about 16 cats in my time and have yet to have a female with nearly as much personality as my most mellow male.
I didn't know about this: I had an orange female in the past and I have one now. She's bigger than most female cats I have seen, though. Meowhous the iconoclast edited this topic ages ago.
I mean, what can you say about a feral who the second time she sees you, throws herself on the ground and tries to get you to rub her tummy. Now, I will admit there are very few orange females in my neighborhood now, but that's because I've been neutering the breeding females (of any color) and males that I can, and the enormous (>23lbs) stray orange tom ("Bruiser") has not been around recently. Briony (no photo available) is also orange, as is her son. She had four kittens when I met her, three boys ( Sonny is one) and one girl, a very typical litter composition for this neighborhood (here's another 3/1 litter, this one black/white, and I've seen other litters that were 3 boys and no girls). I believe torties come from female cats having an orange X chromosome and a black X chromosome. (And nearly 100% of them are insane in some fashion. Something like 75% of orange kitties are male. :o)ĭo you have any idea how tortoiseshell cats come about? Are they just a variation on a calico? Our Tortoiseshell female looks like a ginger tabby with black flecks. I know it can be kind of confusing!! Let me know if that doesn't make sense. This is also the answer to why all calico cats are females (although I think there are a very teeny tiny number of male calicos just because nature isn't perfect). Males have an X and a Y chromosome and the Y is negligent when it comes to color, so if a male's X chromosome carries the dominant orange color it will be an orange cat.įemales get two X chromosomes but what's interesting here is that if a female gets an X chromosome with the dominant orange color and her other X chromosome is for a different color (which most times it is), those two colors will blend and this is usually when you get a calico or tri-colored cat. It has to do with genetics - the orange color is a dominant gene carried on the X chromosome. Well, i have a male orange cat, so I don't know )