The Orange Maine Coon

The Orange Maine Coon

Maine Coon Cats come in many different colors which occur due to crossbreeding that occurs naturally or by breeders.

The orange colored Maine Coon cat comes in different patterns and is stunningly beautiful. On a warm summer’s day it looks like Marmalade.

The Orange Color

Orange colored Maine Coon Cats are often confused for the similar ginger cats.

While they appear to look the same you should note that ginger and orange cats are slightly different.

Orange Maine Coon’s are associated with a red color but with a bit of yellow.

Orange comes from a red yellow mix while ‘ginger’ as a color is more defined as a reddish brown.

If you can look closely at an orange Maine Coon you will notice the color of the orange tree mixed with red.

People will refer to this coat color as a yellow/red.

A ginger cat on the other hand has fur which has traces of brown blended with the red color on their coats.

Thus an Orange Maine Coon is distinguished from its similar looking ginger brethren by a lack of brown or tabby brown predominantly in the coat.

Common Variants of the Orange Color

Orange colored Maine Coon cats come in different variants, they could be smokey or striped.

Most orange Maine Coon Cats are tabbies, meaning that they have markings and stripes throughout their bodies.

Body markings locations are on the lower side of the body and the upper fur.

The Maine Coon would have the base color being orange with stripes of different colors.

Almost all orange Maine Coon Cats are tabbies as they almost have stripes on their bodies.

A solid orange Maine Coon is quite rare.

Orange Maine Coon cats can also be smokey patterned, which is a solid color but with some fade on the coat.

The undercoat is normally lighter in color than the outer coat, and almost always white. Some orange Maine Coon Cats are shaded with a combination of many different colors.

An orange Maine Coon cat might also have black freckles on the face making them more adorable.

According to breeders the Orange Maine Coon cats mostly have a predominant melanin called pheomelanin, which is the same pigment that creates red hair in humans.

If you are a redhead with an orange Maine Coon cat at least, you have something in common to share with your little fella. Or in a Maine Coon’s case, big fella.

Famous Orange Maine Coon’s

Nacho, the adorable orange Maine Coon Cat, caught the attention of the public due to the love from his owner Bobby Flay.

Bobby is an entrepreneur who owns a slew of successful restaurants and frequently appears on hit TV shows.

He says that the object of his affection is his cat named Nacho whom he acquired when he opened his new restaurant in New York City.

Flay had named the cat Gato initially which is a Spanish name for the word cat.

The cat can open doors and play fetch, during shows the chef and his feline friend can even make Nacho’s namesake dish together.

Little Nicky, the first cloned cat, came to the limelight in 2001, it was nicknamed copycat CC and had the same DNA blueprints as the parent cat, Nicky.

The parent cat Nicky was an orange Maine Coon Cat, but surprisingly Little Nicky lacked the color orange in its coat.

Scientists, however, said that the orange gene in cats is peculiar as it is naturally randomly inactivated in some cluster of skin cells and active in other skin cells.

This explains the absence of orange color on Little Nicky as the gene might have been inactivated in all of its skin cells.

How Common are Orange Maine Coons?

Orange Maine Coon Cats can be quite common since the gene for the orange color is found on the X chromosome, thus if one of the parents is orange there is a high likelihood of the offspring being orange.

However since the gene is on the X chromosome the gene will predominantly occur on male offsprings, for instance, only 1 in 5 Orange Maine Coon Cats is female.

Conclusion

The orange Maine Coon Cat is one of the most beautiful variants of the Maine Coon cat breed.

Their stripes make them look beautiful, and if they are dotted with freckles on the face, they are even more adorable.

If you would love to adopt an Orange Maine Coon Cat, you should check the gender of your feline friend since the orange gene color is predominant in male cats.