Auburn Hair – Salmiak Cats – Sunday May 26th 2024

Auburn Hair – Salmiak Cats – Sunday May 26th 2024

The Salmiak Cats’ new coat colour caught my attention. My thought is that this new cat colour occurs, or occurred for a similar reason that Auburn Hair in people originally occurred.

If so, then the new Salmiak cat colour should occur again in the near future.

In people though, there are differences between ourselves and cats, but genes still behave as genes do.

What I concluded long ago, was that when Auburn hair first sprang up for us was likely due to an issue with the genetics for black hair. And was most likely the case for the Neanderthal people too.

Each of my parents had to have the genetics for Auburn hair, for me to have Auburn hair with brown eyes. Neither of my parents were Auburn haired though. So they carried the trait, (though my father did freckle a little and couldn’t tan and in the sunshine you could see Auburn in his black hair) but somewhere far back in our ancestry there is someone who had Auburn hair when it first appeared.

My conclusion though is that when the pigment and other associated genes attempt to link, an error is detected in the attempt, which triggers the new mutation. In the case of Auburn hair, the likely culprit is a worn out gene for black hair belonging to either or both parents.

Fiona MacLeod (C)