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Velvet Nevskiy Modern

🐱 Siberian

📸 LETO Photografia [Nevskiy Modern]

🎨 Blue Mackerel Tabby

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🐱 Singapura

📸 Diana Bauriniene [Invictus Soul]

🎨 Sepia Agouti

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🐱 Egyptian Mau

📸 Bianca Anderson [MauLove]

🎨 Black Smoke

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my old girl Marble, who I said goodbye to back in 2016/2017. She was dumped at our house (unfortunately not an uncommon occurrence where I live), and within just a few days of her arrival became the most spoiled old lady in the world. She was crotchety, a cheeze-it fiend, and possibly the sweetest cat I ever had. She would always lay with me when I got sick/had surgery <3

She had beautiful fur, my family always called her a torbie but I don't know much about cat genetics/cat coats, so I'd love to know if we were right or not

They’re correct, although the term they used was informal!

Torbie is a colloquial term for “tortoiseshell tabby,” which she was. Her pattern is very brindled so I can’t tell you what type of tabby except not classic.

I’m sorry for your loss, she sounds very special. My guy is also a cheez-it fiend, next time I have some I’ll give him one (1) in her honor.

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Tsushima Island Fanta

🐱 Maine Coon

📸 Naumenko Aleksej [Tsushima Island]

🎨 Blue Smoke

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🐱 American Shorthair

📸 Helen Zimmer [Vibrations Cattery]

🎨 Black Classic Tabby

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Elizabete’s Caprice III of Macrory

🐱 Scottish Straight

📸 Tessa [Macrory]

🎨 Red Bicolor

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🐱 British Shorthair

📸 Svetlana Sevruk

🎨 Black Golden Shaded

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🐱 Domestic Shorthair

📸 camogains

🎨 Black Tabby Van

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🐱 Siberian

📸 Yuliya Zheleznyak [Tavaloga*RU]

🎨 Red Mackerel Tabby

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🐱 Oriental Shorthair

📸 Tatiana Makukhina [Mockingbird Cattery]

🎨 Chocolate Classic Tortoiseshell Tabby

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UA*Sweet Beast Koya

🐱 British Shorthair

📸 Sweet Beast

🎨 Cinnamon Tortoiseshell Bicolor

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Cinder arrived as a one pound kitten in late April as part of an owner relinquished litter. Based on coat color and external genitalia, they went into a foster home as a female and was named Cindi. Her foster family said she was a typical loving, adventuresome and playful kitten. After five weeks in foster care, Cindi returned for her spay surgery. During the surgery Dr. Bloodworth discovered Cindi did not have a uterus nor ovaries. The HSCO veterinary team found and removed two testicles. After the surgery, Cindi was renamed Cinder.

🐱 Domestic Longhair

📸 Humane Society of Central Oregon

🎨 Black Tortoiseshell [Mosaics, Chimeras & Tortie Tomcats] [Klinefelter Tortie Males]

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🐱 Exotic Shorthair

📸 Olga Derkach [Golden Drops]

🎨 Red Classic Tabby Bicolor

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Final (hopefully) Notes on Moonpaw

So first off I’d like to specify this is not a Warriors blog.

The Warriors series was hugely important to me during my childhood so there’s a definite nostalgia factor there. I no longer read the books but I still interact with the material and community.

There is a hefty overlap between the cat genetics + phenotype community and Warriors fans. A non-insignificant portion of my followers are involved with the series to some extent.

As such the subject will occasionally come up. Going forward these instances will be tagged as #wc bullshit, even if the circumstances or nature of the discussion aren’t negative. It’s just better to have one consistent tan people can block.

But ultimately this is not and will never be a Warriors blog.

Now onto the matter at hand.

Let’s summarize.

Moonpaw is the protagonist of the upcoming series of Warriors. The official website recently released her design as well as her parents, which has caused a buzz within the community for multiple reasons.

She is labeled as a chimera in her description, which the authors represent with a split-face pattern. A notable aspect of her story is going to center around this and how unique and special this makes her…

Which only demonstrates the authors poor understanding of the subject, as the split-face pattern is a normal presentation of tortoiseshell coloration and something which would certainly have occured numerous time within the clans population prior to now.

One of the authors thought mackerel referred to a green-hued cat, though. So.

It is possible for Moonpaw to be a chimera in the same way it is possible for any character to be or have been a chimera, there is no singular way for chineric cats to look and phenotypically normal cats can be chimeric and it’s just not detected because no-one knows to look for it.

But the split-face in itself isn’t suggestive of being a chimera, this is a widely perpetuated myth.

The belief that split face = chimera may be a relatively benign misunderstanding but it’s somewhat concerning how devoted to this misbelief some people seem to be. It’s okay to be wrong, it’s okay to not have known something. If you’re given new information accept it, don’t come snapping back with “Why does it matter?”

It’s a slippery slope to try and decide what degree of misinformation is acceptable to spread and the way some people react to almost as if it’s a personal slight to be told is teetering dangerously close to anti-intellectualism, especially during a time where misinformation in general is on the rise a la AI.

Don’t get me wrong, deliberate information can be fun to play with because it involves some degree of understanding that it isn’t true. Goncharov is an excellent example of “Yes, and” and sometimes I’ll assigned completely fabricated breeds to followers cats as part of a game.

This is different than sincere ignornance.

And we’re already seeing the inevitable conclusion of this behavior, I’ve seen swaths of misinformation about chimerism stemming from this which are not as benign as the initial split-face misbelief.

Chimerism occurs when two zygotes fuse into one organism… and that’s all chimerism is.

Chimerism is not a and is not related to any disability. It is actually so benign that we don’t know how common it actually is because most remain undiagnosed because there’s no inclination to test for it.

In instances where it is tested for this usually isn’t due to any medical complication for the individual, rather reproductive anomalies seem to be the most common instigator for testing, such as someone failing a parental DNA test.

So of course Moonpaw could be disabled but in the same way literally any character could be disabled. There’s been nothing in her design or the rest of the source material we’ve seen thus far that indicates she’s canonically disabled. Her chimerism is irrelevant to this subject.

Chimerism is also not inherently an intersex condition, although it absolutely can be. Intersex conditions occur when there are chromosomal, hormonal or anatomical variations that deviate from the narrowly defined social norm of one sex or another.

Ezra is a well-known chimera who with 96% XX and 4% XY chromosomes in blood but 100/% XY chromosomes in skin which means Ezra is intersex… but if the zygotes that fused were both XX or XY the individual would not be intersex due to their chimerism, though.

Discrimination of intersex people is a real problem.

But it has nothing to do with Moonpaw as a chimera.

Of course Moonpaw could be intersex, the same as any character could be intersex. Moonpaw can even be intersex as a direct result of her chimerism, as is the case with Ezra! But being a chimera in and of itself isn’t an indication that she’s intersex, it is entirely possible for her to be a chimera and still be endosex.

So once again there is nothing present in the canon we’ve been presented with thus far to indicate she’s canonically intersex, and if she is intersex then her chimerism may or may not be relevant.

And finally… the inbreeding issue.

I’d like to emphasize that Moonpaw being inbred was not a deliberate choice made by the authors and is not intended to represent individuals born from a consanguineous union. The cast of these books are tremendous and they fail to keep track of the family tree, frequently resulting in related characters being paired essentially due to sloppy record keeping.

So with this in mind nothing has been included in the canon thus far to indicate Moonpaw canonically experiences any adverse effects due to her lineage.

Anyways, it seems that people learned about the Habsburg family in 9th grade and that they had health kssues attributed to inbreeding and that… is where their knowledge on the subject ends, I guess?

The problem with inbreeding from a strictly biological perspective is that recessive traitd are retained and perpetuated. This article from BBC Earth does a pretty good job of breaking down the jist of the issue in a language that’s pretty accessible to the layperson.

Speaking of the Habsburg I’ve seen Moonpaw’s situation related to them a few times so I plugged Moonpaw’s family and the Habsburg family into a calculator to see how similar their COI (coefficient of inbreeding) is.

Moonpaw has a COI of 11.62% which is about the same degree of relatedness as first cousins while Charles II of the Habsburg family had a COI of 25.20% which is the same degree of relatedness as half-siblings.

So if Moonpaw were to display characteristics of inbreeding they would most likely be hypertyping (essentially extreme preservation of family traits), recessive traits (which may be benign) or inherited disorders such as PK Deficiency.

Other characteristics of inbreeding in cats that we’ve seen come through the clinic include pectus excavatum, abnormal testicular and lymphatic tissue, bilateral or unilateral cryptorchidism, or non-severe structural abnormalities such as a syndactyl digit or additional, small tail vertebrae.

So there’s no reason to believe Moonpaw would resemble the mother from Barbarian (2022) and real people born of incest don’t actually look and act like that either. It’s a horror movie myth and acting like it’s an accurate representation does a disservice to those genuinely born into and disabled due to such circumstances.

Side Note: Jokes about incest aren’t funny and stereotypes about inbreeding in rural areas are deeply rooted in classism.

A final note that the inbreeding is entirely unrelated to the chimerism, there is no evidence that inbreeding increases the likelihood of chimerism occuring. So logically and canonically her chimerism and her inbreeding exist completely independent of each other.

So TL;DR

Moonpaw could be a chimera but the premise that her split-face is indicative of being a chimera is based in misinformation.

Moonpaw being a chimera is not and is not related to a disability.

Moonpaw being a chimera can cause her to be intersex but her being intersex is not a given based solely on her being a chimera.

Moonpaw is inbred due to author negligence but the way people visualize the effects of this are grossly sensationalized.

Moonpaw being inbred and Moonpaw being a chimera are unrelated.

Chimera, disability and intersex headcanons are awesome for any and all characters indepent of canon. Go wild!

[felinefractious]

Honey Ginger Kaiser

🐱 Selkirk Rex [Homozygous]

📸 Marina Dmitrenko [Honey Ginger]

🎨 Chocolate Smoke

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BeFurry Zeus

🐱 Bengal

📸 BeFurry Bengal

🎨 Seal Silver Rosetted Tabby Point