Emerging Colors and Patterns

“The only thing certain is change” goes an old saying. However, sometimes there is actual change, and sometimes change is the result of more accurate information.

- Teresa Keiger

A few emerging colors and patterns within our breeds demonstrate this, making the world’s most colorful mammal – the cat – even more colorful! These colors and patterns developed in geographic isolation, that is, within specific areas of the world which have also been somewhat geographically or politically isolated from the West.

This article covers a few of these emerging colors and patterns, discussing primarily the presentation of these new-to-us colors and patterns in the cat, leaving a description of the mechanics behind them to a more scholarly resource.

The Golden Tabby Pattern in the Siberian

There’s Something New With the “Sunshine Gene” 

The first thing to know about the golden tabby (and other golden colorations) in Siberians is that it is NOT genetically the same as the golden we see in Persians (and other breeds). In most breeds, “golden” describes a hair shaft that is solid gold and solid black on the tips. This pattern is dispersed evenly across the body; there is no tabby pattern. 1, 9

Golden tabby Siberians have a differently colored hair shaft. Here, the hair shaft is gold, but the tips range from a distinctly rich, warm brown to black and color is present across the body in any of the four tabby patterns. This difference is on the genetic level as the pattern is produced by the recently discovered CORIN gene. The golden tabby compresses the agouti pattern to the very end of the hair shaft. Within the breed, the distinction between these two patterns is made as “chinchilla golden” or “shaded golden” and the “golden tabby.”2