Rusty black cats

[Hopelass]

I love how my black cat goes "rusty" in the sun! Anyone else have a rusty cat?

Here she is looking a little brown.

I have 3 black cats and the senior one at 15 is going rusty, he's in stage 2 renal failure but not sure if that has anything to do with his fur?

Aw pipbin she's lovely. Amazing all these variations of black cats. That's why they're the best colour

Autumn from what LoneCat said upthread about rusting maybe being associated with kidney problems then it's likely, yes. I think the rusting in natural light is when it's more likely due to age/deficiency from what I gather.

My cat Dave is exactly the same . He's more rusty on one side from where he lies in the sun !

Every cat is a tabby, genetically. Tabbies that look tabby have solid-coloured stripes, and paler bits with agouti fur (where the individual hairs have alternating pale and dark bands).

Solid black (and grey) cats have the 'agouti-suppressing' gene, which makes the banded hairs solid-coloured too - but they are still somehow different to the hairs in the solid-coloured stripes, so in certain lights the tabby pattern is revealed. And as DigestiveBiscuit says, there are also 'smoke' cats which have a white layer at the very very base of the non-tabby hairs, so look like very very dark tabbies. The one on the left of this pile is a black smoke.

i seem to remember a supplement called SA37 that would prevent this. i am not sure if you can still get it though. or if im remembering correctly

I have 2 jet black cats, they look rusty too in strong sunlight.

I took in an ancient emaciated stray - he was black & white with rusty patches in the black - once he was fed properly & fatter & healthier, the rust reverted to black.

That's fascinating Gerund. Does it apply to cats with the Himalayan Gene, (basically albino, and as they get older, their points darken and the eyes stay blue).

I've got a colourpoint Devon-Rex, and the colder it gets, the more his hair darkens. He was born completely white. His tail and paws are chocolate and white, His ears and bandit mask go really dark, like a seal point. His main body is a sort of very pale apricot. I've never seen even a hint of tabby markings. I can see them faintly on my b&w mogster.

Looking at Liitle Monsieur just now, he looks really funny - he's grown mutton chops, one much longer than the other. Especially atop his bald, wrinkly neck. (Well his neck has a fine covering of peach fuzz.) If you took his ears away, he'd look just like E.T. with facial hair.

Yes, all cats have an allele for one of the three or four possible tabby patterns. Also all cats are either black or ginger (or both at once, in the case of tortoiseshells). The various other genes (including agouti-suppressing, himalayan, dilutions of various kinds, white-spotting and white-masking) act alongside the tabby and the black/ginger, modifying or in some cases masking them.

Your Little Monsieur, if I am remembering him rightly, would be, genetically, a brown tabby... but also with the agouti-suppressing allele (making his coloured bits solid or 'self', not tabby-patterned), plus the himalayan allele (temp-sensitive partial albinism, giving the pointed pattern, and making his points brown not black), plus the white-spotting allele, giving him some pure white bits. As well as genes coding for curly fur, gremlin ears and extreme cuteness :)

Thanks for the reply Gerund You can only really see the albinism when his pupils dilate in a state of excitement, - his eyes glow red instead of golden, like non-albino cats.

He does look like a little Gremlin. And if I tickle his back feet, he splays his toes out.