Top Posts Tagged with #ghost markings

I'm curious: have you ever seen a classic tabby smoke? I would imagine they're quite dramatic...

Yes, I have because one of my own cats (Faolan, see below) is a black smoke with an underlying classic tabby pattern. ;) However let’s just talk real quick about the proper terminology, because a “tabby smoke” is by definition not possible. “Smoke” means the cat is a solid colour + silver. If the cat is a tabby + silver it will be called “silver tabby”.

BUT sometimes we can see a smoke cat (solid) clearly showing tabby markings! So what’s going on here? All cats are in truth tabbies. There are other colours though— like solids — which will hide that tabby pattern from being visible. Sometimes the tabby pattern is not fully surpressed and it shines through. This is called “ghost marks”. They are especially common in smokes and usually better visible when the cats are kittens or still young. Ghost markings tend to fade if not completely disappear with age.

Personally I think all smokes look fantastic be it with or without ghost markings, but at least for show cats ghost markings are a big “no-no”, because they are supposed to look solid and not like a tabby, which makes sense.

Here are a few examples of quite extreme black smoke with classic tabby ghost markings (+ scroll to the end for my boy Faolan <3). Enjoy!

Mixed Monday Special:black smoke with ghost markings (classic tabby)