"The Silver Tabby owes its name to the absence of yellow
pigment from the agouti areas of the coat."
(from Robinsons Genetics for Cat Breeders and Veterinarians)
seal silver lynx point
Notice the cold "black and white" look of
his point color. The yellow around his muzzle is referred to as
tarnishing.
This photo is used with permission of
the owner and is copyright property.
The Inhibitor gene ( I ) is a dominant gene. A cat can not carry
this gene. A kitten can receive this gene from either parent but ONLY if
one (or both) parent has the gene. The smoke cat is a non-agouti cat
with the Inhibitor gene. The silver is an agouti (tabby) cat with the
Inhibitor gene. The degree of white undercoat is controlled by poly
genes, most cats with the Inhibitor gene will show a white base to the
hair shafts, close to the skin. The Inhibitor gene has a greater affect
on the yellow pigment (phaeomelanin) than on black pigment (eumelanin).
The affect of the Inhibitor gene is to remove the yellow pigment
from the hair shaft.
A Silver tabby cat is easily recognized by the stark contrast of
"black and white" between the stripes. Notice the lighter
cheek pads on the brown tabby, this is an affect of the agouti gene, and
has no relation to the presence of the Inhibitor gene.
brown patch tabby
silver tabby
These photos used with permission of
the owners and are copyright property.
seal lynx point mitted
seal silver lynx point mitted
The contrast between the stripes is not as distinct in a
pointed cat, due to the fact that the point color is already affected by
the pointed gene making it slightly less dense than the color in a
non-pointed cat (ie: seal vs black) You can see this seal lynx point cat
pictured above has a warm brown background between his seal brown
stripes... compared to the silver white background between the seal
brown stripes of the seal silver lynx point.
A smoke cat should look similar to a non-smoke cat since the ends of
ALL the hair shafts are pigmented. When you split the hair coat you will
see a silvery white base. The undercoat on a true silver/smoke is
NOT just a lighter shade of color... it is silvery white. The
best place to check for this is on the head or front legs. Notice the
dark cheek pads on the smoke cat, and the silver/white undercoat showing
in the tail.
black
black smoke
A lighter undercoat is not unusual in a pointed
cat, due to the temperature sensitive nature of the pointed gene.
The Inhibitor gene removes the yellow pigment from
the base of the hair. There is a difference. There are polygenes that
control the amount of the hair shaft that is deposited with color. These
genes have been selected for in the shaded cats to push the color all
the way to the ends of the hair. A golden is an example of a cat with
the affect of these polygenes. A Golden is a shaded cat without the
inhibitor gene. It is possible that our Ragdolls have some of
these polygenes that contribute to making their undercoats lighter,
since silver Persians most likely have been used in some lines of our
Ragdolls. This does not make them silver. Unless your cat has a silvery
white undercoat, it does not have the inhibitor gene.
Silver and Golden Persians are both genetically black
(brown) tabby cats. The silver has the Inhibitor gene, the golden has
the same polygenes as the silver that push the color to the ends of the
hair shaft, leaving a lighter undercoat, but no inhibitor removing
the yellow pigment from the hair.
Do You Want the Silver/Smoke Colors?
response from a TICA Genetics Committee member, and a TICA
Rules and Technology Committee member
"It is correct that all new colors must be presented through the
breed chair - there must be an affirmative vote of the entire breed
section to approve the new color."
"IMO, there was NO oversight of this color - the Ragdoll
breeders at the time of the formation of TICA made a conscious decision
to only approve the eumelanistic solid color division - the tabby points
and tortie points and red points are recent additions."
"There is no reason why these colors couldn't be added if the
majority of all Ragdoll breeders want them - as I said before, if you
have these cats, they may be exhibited in the new Assessment class come
1 April - and they would need to follow the procedure for approval of
new colors as set forth in the newly passed New Breed program, effective
May 1:
"I think that you need to be very careful as identifying cats
as silvers because their coloring is "cold" - there are many
breeds which have cold colored tabbies - and this doesn't make them
silvers - I am sure that there are lynx point Ragdolls which are cold in
coloring - but are not silvers."
"We see a lot of "wishing that makes it so" colors
- silver lynx points can be VERY difficult to identify - and there will
probably have to be some test breedings to determine if the cats are
truly silver."
