Maine Coon coat patterns

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 'Patterns' obviously means the shape and design of the markings on a cat as dictated by the cat's genetic makeup (genotype). The breed standards including that of the number one cat association, the CFA, allow a huge range of coat types for the Maine Coon. It is one of their defining features. Although you'll see the majority of Maine Coons with tabby coats.

Maine Coon with a classic (blotched) tabby pattern
Maine Coon with a classic (blotched) tabby pattern. Image: Ruffians Maine Coons.

I have listed the patterns and types in the table below. This table shows more than the patterns such as mackerel or classic tabby and bicolor. It also refers to the colours.

Please use the bars at the base of the spreadsheet to move it around.

Technically, "solid colours" does not constitute a pattern because there is no pattern but I have included it in the list for completeness. 

The description "patched tabby" refers to a tortoiseshell tabby coat which is also described as a torbie. As the description indicates, the coat is 'patchy' including dark or greyish brown and patches of red or orange. 

Torbie cats.

The tabby coat can also be seen in three different types namely mackerel, spotted and blotched or classic.

The bicolour coat is white and another colour. Often the solid colour parts are blotches and spots but they can be large areas and it depends upon how the white spotting gene (piebald gene) has created the coat during development.

Miss Kate a bicolor Maine Coon
Miss Kate a bicolor Maine Coon. Image copyright Helmi Flick.

The description "parti-color" refers to a coat with more than one colour. For example, it includes tortoiseshell and calico cats (tortie-and-white).

Smoke cat coats are difficult to describe as a pattern because it refers to a coat which, as you might expect, gives the appearance of smoke which means the tip of the hair strands are darker than the underparts. I've stretched the boundaries of the title in providing this in the list but it is there for completeness as well.

The shaded code is similar. It is a form of "tipping" which is a reference to the tip of each hair strand being a different colour to the remainder of the hair strand. Sarah Hartwell describes them as tabby cats with diffused markings plus inhibitor plus a lesser degree of wide-band". They may have a diffuse classical mackerel tabby pattern. The colour extends about halfway down each hair shaft.

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