A Pet's View / November 2006
Tabby Cats
In cats, tabby isn’t about parentage, it’s about pattern. Tabbies are often mistakenly considered a breed, but actually a tabby cat is one with a distinctive coat that features stripes, dots and swirling patterns. The tabby pattern is a naturally occurring feature that may be the original coloration of the domestic cat’s distant ancestors. The familiar tabby coloration is found in many breeds of cat, as well as among the general cat population.
‘Tabby’ comes from French tabis, which was earlier atabis, and in medieval Latin attabi.
The origin of the word seems to be from an area in Baghdad where a type of striped silk was made that was later used to describe cats.
The Rodney Dangerfield of the feline world, tabbies are often lumped together as ‘alley cats’ and placed low in cat hierarchy. But, the tabby pattern is so common it is found in many pedigreed cats today, and is accepted in a number of breeds by the most popular registries. In fact, the gene for tabby pattern can be found in all domestic cats. When viewed in the sunlight, even a coal black will reveal its hidden tabby markings.
There are three genetically distinct tabby patterns: mackerel, classic, and ticked, and a fourth variation, spotted, that is still undergoing debate.
The most common tabby pattern is mackerel. Mackerel tabbies have striped rings around their tail and legs, a “necklace” of stripes on the front of their chests, and bands of solid or broken stripes running down the sides of their bodies. They will have the darker color in spots running in two lines across their tummies, called “vest buttons.” They often have the ‘M’ shape on their forehead. Mackerels also have a ‘peppered’ nose, where black spots appear along the pink tip of the nose.
Classic tabbies usually have whorls ending in a “target” on the side of the cat. Many American Shorthair cats carry the Classic pattern. They have a similar ‘M’ pattern on the head, but the body markings are very different, having a whorled and swirled pattern with thicker stripes that make “butterfly” patterns on their shoulders and usually that bulls-eye or oyster pattern on the flank.
The Agouti, or ticked, tabby pattern produces hairs with distinct bands of color on them, breaking up the tabby patterning into a salt-and-pepper appearance. However, ghost striping or “barring” can often be seen on the legs, face and belly. Most tabbies cats will have agouti hairs as part of their pattern, with different bands of color down the length of the cat’s individual hairs. Cats with an all-ticked pattern almost shimmer in the sunlight, because of their color variation.
The spotted tabby may not be a true pattern, but a modifier that breaks up the mackerel pattern so that the stripes appear as spots; the stripes of the classic pattern may be broken into larger spots.
When cats are allowed to breed randomly, the coloration of the population tends toward brown mackerel tabbies with green eyes, like humans with brown hair and green eyes. Leading geneticists believe that this is the common wild phenotype of the domestic cat.
In cat genetics, pattern is unrelated to color, so the tabby pattern may occur in any cat color, including tortoiseshell, (Breeders call tortoiseshell tabby cats ‘torbies’). White spotting of any level can also appear in combination with tabby patterns.
Amusing, intelligent, and warmly affectionate, tabby cats deserve a great deal more respect than they command, but people who share their home with a tabby rarely have illusions about who is in charge of the household.
Copyright © 2007 A Woman's View. All rights reserved.
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