this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2026
348 points (99.7% liked)
cats
27103 readers
1243 users here now
Typical internet cats. Videos, pics, memes, and discussion welcome!
Rule 1) Be kind
Rule 2) Follow the lemmy.world rules
other cat communities
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Hold on. A female ginger?
That's incredibly rare. http://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwywdjjgvqqo.amp
Apparently it's roughly an 80% chance that a ginger is male, so not quite incredibly rare. Male calicos are, though!
Male calicos are in the "you really sure that's a male cat or a calico cat cause it's that rare better check again"...rareness
I've only seen two in my life.
When I was very young we had a female ginger and then a friend of mine had one when we were about 12 or so.
Whenever I see a ginger I just assume they are male.
It's the same with calico cats as well from what I understand, almost all are female.
Yep, to get calico coloring, cats must have two X chromosomes, so they will be female. If a male calico is born, it will be XXY. So that's a rare mutation to encounter, and those cats are always sterile too, so they're not passing along their mutation to any kittens either.
Torties are almost always female, also. My family are big fans of Torties.