Scraggly Patchy - Feral Cat Photo Of The Day

The winter coat coming in - that's what gives this tabby/tortoise shell/calico 'torbie' cat its scraggly look.

She also appears to be getting over a cold. The color pattern of this cute kitty is very similar to another cat we've seen here before...

The cat above was trapped and spayed fairly young (you can barely see the ear tattoo), though, so there isn't a direct relationship. They might be first cousins or something like that.

Anyway, Scraggly hasn't been trapped yet, but I know she's  a girl. How? Genetics: Like people, normal cats have two sex chromosomes. Males have one female (X) chromosome and one male (Y) chromosome, while females have 2 female (XX) chromosomes. This is exactly the same as people, by the way. The color gene for a cat's fur is located on the X (female) chromosome. You can have two on or off expressions on one chromosome - so three or more colors would normally mean you'd need 2 X chromosomes - in other words, a female cat. If you are interested in more about coat genetics, check out this link.

That's it for today!