Just curious, as I’ve never seen this type of genetic irregularity in other types of pets that people keep. Thanks in advance!
In: Biology
Polydactyly is a dominant trait, which means you only have to have one parent give you the gene for it, like brown hair, rather than needing a copy from each parent like red hair.
It also doesn’t have a huge disadvantage when I comes to living a normal cat life and making little cats.
As such, it spreads through cat populations easily, especially in places where people seek the trait out and breed for it, like Ernest Hemingway and all his mitten cats.
Their descendants still are mittening and kittening to this day around his estate.
Polydactyly is also a dominant gene in humans, which demonstrates that dominant doesn’t necessarily mean common. Something tells me that how humans treat humans that are different than them led to this trait not being passed on as much.
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