![]() ![]() Interestingly, the French word for “striped silk taffeta” is “tabis.” English people called the cloth “tabby,” short for Attabiya. The silk cloth produced by this district eventually found its way to England, and became very popular. The district itself was named for Attab ibn Asid, who was the governor of Mecca in the early 600s. There is a district in Baghdad called Attabiya, that was known for making beautiful striped silk cloth. The word “tabby” comes from the Muslim world, and a special silk fabric. There are many, many examples of this strategy in nature. The American Bittern, for example, which is a vertically striped bird, stretches its neck up and sways when approached by a predator, looking for all the world just like the reeds in which it lives. The trick isn’t unique to cats, by the way. In fact, this non-agouti gene doesn’t always work perfectly, which is why many solid-colored cats have a hint of striping. The non-agouti gene prevents the hair from producing that lighter pigment while the strand is growing. It’s a gene that just hides the tabby-ness. The non-agouti gene isn’t a “non-tabby” gene. Here’s where you might argue that a solid-colored cat is, in fact, not a tabby cat. In other words, there will be no gene to stop and start hair pigmentation and he will end up looking like a solid-colored cat. But if a cat gets two recessive genes – one from his mom and one from his dad – he will be non-agouti. The agouti gene is dominant, which means if a cat gets even one from a parent, he will have agouti fur and look like a tabby cat. That's how agouti hair strands get their bands of color. Then it slows the pigmentation down in the middle, and then speeds it up again at the end. When a hair is first growing, the agouti gene allows it to be fully pigmented. The agouti gene messes with pigmentation while each individual strand of hair is growing. The following five patterns are all types of tabby markings.The first set of genes that we need to talk about when discussing tabby-ness is the agouti gene, which allows hairs to be banded with darker and lighter colors. ![]() The best way to determine if a cat is a tabby is to study its coat pattern. Different Types Of Tabby Cats Markings And Coat Patterns Sometimes coat markings are faint or similar in color to the rest of the hair, but they’re there if you look close enough. Sometimes with other colored cats, you can only see the tabby markings if the light hits the fur at the right angle. This is because the gene for those coat colors also makes tabby markings visible.Īlso Read: All About The Majestic Orange Tabby Cats For example, you’ll never find an orange or cream-colored cat that is not a tabby. Without pulling out the punnet squares we learned in high school biology, there are other ways to determine if a cat is a tabby without taking a close look at the coat patterns. Besides the classic “M” marking, tabbies also have thin stripes on their faces and markings around their eyes. Legend says this letter stands for Mau, the ancient Egyptian word for “cat.” Others claim the “M” stands for Mohammed or the Virgin Mary. All tabbies have a distinctive “M” on their forehead. You can start identifying a tabby by looking at the cat’s face. You can’t call every cat a tabby cat, but it is the most common coat pattern among domestic cat breeds (including mixed breeds). Some cats have other genes that mask the tabby characteristics. This doesn’t, however, make every cat a tabby cat. If you want to get technical, all cats possess the gene for tabby markings. Identifying a tabby starts with understanding what a tabby actually is and knowing the different ways those genes affect coat patterns. The term “tabby,” however, refers to a cat’s coat pattern and has nothing to do with breed. You can also breed cats to have traditional tabby characteristics. It’s true that many tabby cats can look alike. It’s a common mistake, however, to use this word to identify a specific cat breed or cats in general. When someone says the word “tabby,” it’s clear they’re talking about cats. ![]()
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