Original photo by owngarden/ iStock
Aside from all being adorable, 80% of orange cats have something else in common: They’re male. Only one in five of the notoriously goofy felines are female, as some color is inextricably linked to biological sex in cats.
A male cat will be orange if he carries that gene on either of his chromosomes, whereas a female needs to carry it on both. So if a female orange cat becomes pregnant, her male kittens will be orange regardless of the color of their father’s fur, but a female kitten will be orange only if both of her parents are. Regardless, orange kitties are especially beloved on the internet for their perceived eccentricities and proclivity for being a bit goofy.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are calico cats and their distinct tricolor coats (usually white, orange, and black), an even vaster majority of which are female: Only one in 3,000 calicos are male. A cat has to have two X chromosomes in order to be calico, which, in theory, rules out males entirely, as they have only one. Those extremely rare male calicos result from an extra X chromosome, a condition similar to Klinefelter’s syndrome in humans. They’re also almost always sterile due to that second X chromosome, making male calicos exceedingly difficult to breed.
Numbers Don't Lie
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The tiny “hooks” on a cat’s tongue are called ______.
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The tiny “hooks” on a cat’s tongue are called papillae.
All clownfish are born male.
There may be a reason both main characters in Finding Nemo are male: All clownfish are born that way, and it’s only when a group’s dominant female dies or disappears that a male develops into a female and becomes the new matriarch. All clownfish have the ability to turn female, and the change is permanent once it occurs.
The transformation begins almost immediately after the dominant female is gone and starts in the brain before manifesting itself in the sex organs. Had the beloved Pixar film been devoted to scientific accuracy, Nemo’s father, Marlin, may not have been just his son’s sole caregiver after tragedy befell the boy’s mother — he may literally have become his mother.
Michael Nordine is a writer and editor living in Denver. A native Angeleno, he has two cats and wishes he had more.
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