KittyCatS! Community Forum

Hi everyone!

It's time (well, actually, it's past time, but RL hasn't been co-operating lol) for me to welcome you all to the newest Instructional Breeding Project! This will be the third one (the first was done by Wendi, with a bit of support from Sanura and myself, back in May of 2013 (http://kittycats.biz/forum/showthread.php?tid=9122), while the second started last September http://kittycats.biz/forum/showthread.php?tid=18240). The project has been our attempt to help de-mystify working with a starter, as well as maybe hitting on a few other aspects of KittyCatS! breeding along the way.

This will follow a similar format to the previous 2 projects. I already have a starter (Meridel) and a partner for her (Lin) ready to go (in fact, Meridel should drop her first box in a couple of days). In the next post (which should be Saturday), I will give you my take on these two cats, and talk a bit about working with starters. After that, I will post the results of each breeding, along with a detailed explanation of what I think happened and where to go from here, as well as talking about things like choosing a partner for a starter, breeding techniques, etc. It will give you a bit of insight into how one breeder thinks when working with a starter. Feel free to make comments or ask questions as we once again embark on this journey of virtual feline trait discovery!

So, get out that bag of popcorn (or kibble, or whatever), and enjoy the ride!

The cats are out at the Instructional Breeding Project location (http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/At...3/189/127)) (thank you once again to Wendi for providing the location, as well as the great breeding tutorial that is there).

At this time I also want to provide a link to Saga's collection of charts and other useful breeding information: https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B0_Wqb...iMDhm/edit.

Okay, let's begin.

Working with starters is a key part of KittyCatS! breeding. Starters provide an opportunity to bring the newest traits into your cattery, when they're at their most valuable. They are a bit of a gamble (you normally never know what traits they hide until they pass them), so it's important to put yourself in the best possible position to benefit when you get a starter with one or more good new traits.

The single most important thing you can do is provide your starters with good partners that will help you learn what your starters are hiding, and have the potential to nicely traited kittens when bred with your starters. KittyCatS! starters have 9 genesis traits showing, and are guaranteed to hide a non-genesis fur, eye colour, ear, tail, whisker colour and whisker shape; their hidden eye shape, pupil size and shade may be or may not be genesis. Therefore, our first goal when working with a starter is to learn what those 6 guaranteed hidden non-genesis traits are, as well as learning if there are any non-genesis traits hiding.

The key to learning about your starter's hidden traits is the partner you put with your starter. There are 3 things I look for when I'm choosing a partner for my starter. First (and most importantly), I want a cat that has shown non-genesis traits for the 6 guaranteed non-genesis hiddens in my starter (fur, eye colour, ear, tail, whisker colour and whisker shape), and preferably shown non-genesis traits for all 9 traits. If you have any genesis traits showing in your starter's partner, they may cause you not to know when your starter has passed their non-genesis hiddens to their kittens. Secondly, I prefer to use cats fairly recessive traits as partners with my starters, since their traits are more likely to hide behind the ones the starter passes, revealing exactly what the starter is hiding. Finally, I like using cats with retired traits as starter partners whenever possible, since if a kitten coming from a starter shows a retired trait, you know for sure that the kitten's shown retired trait came from the non-starter partner (since by definition a retired trait can't be hiding in a starter), and therefore the kitten's hidden trait must have come from the starter. The more information you have, the better!

Without further ado, let's talk about the stars of our show.... the CATS!

First of all, the center of attention....our starter, Meridel:



As is generally the cases with starters that haven't bred yet, there isn't much to say her. I will however, point out that this cat was rezzed and unboxed before the new Fall starters came out. This will be important to remember, since it means we can't assume that the newly retired traits (at least one of which is in our starter's partner, as you will soon see) won't be hiding in this starter. For example, if our starter has a kitten with Curious whiskers, the Curious whiskers could have come from Meridel, even though Curious whiskers are now considered retired.

Now let us consider Meridel's first partner, Lin:



The first thing of note is that Lin is the son of Sydney, Arti's partner for most of IBP2! His shown traits are identical to Sydney's in fact. His hiddens (which all come from Mom) are much more interesting though. His hidden fur is probably another retired fur, Balinese Cream Lynx, though there is a chance of it being Pandie Brown & White or more recessive (his mother's common grandfather was a Pandie Brown and White). His hidden eye will either be Mom's shown Strawberry Bellini (which, remember was only recently retired, so may still hide in Meridel) or Odyssey Kaleidoscope, which is Mom's hidden eye (learned from her breedings). Lin's shade is probably pure Flair, though there is the possibility of a much more recessive shade hiding (her Mom's grandparents had some kittens together with Flash shade). My guess is that Lin's hidden tail, ears and whisker colour are Posh, Odyssey Rounded Fold and Chocolate, respectively, as I think those traits are pure in his mother, but I'm not sure of those. From previous breedings on Lin's, I know that he hides at least Frazzled whiskers (he has fathered a Frazzled-whiskered kitten), but I'm not precisely sure what the hidden whisker shape is. To sum it up, Lin is a 9T cat, with retired shown fur, retired shown eye colour, possibly a retired hidden fur, and decent traits showing and hiding everywhere else, so he's a solid cat to use as a starter partner!

Meridel's and Lin's first breeding together should happen soon, so stay tuned!

Before we look at the result of Meridel's first breeding with Lin, a bit of an update on Lin. In the previous post, I stated that Lin probably hides Posh tail. Due to breedings of a son of Lin's, I can confirm that Lin does indeed hide Posh tail. Now on to the first breeding!

Meridel and Lin had their first box together! Let's look at it and see what we can find out (remember, our main goal at this point is to learn as much as possible about the non-genesis traits that starter Meridel is hiding):



First of all, let's note that Week 1 Kitten is showing 2 non-genesis traits (Mysterious ears and Black whiskers), and genesis traits everywhere else. Since non-starter Lin is a 9-traiter (i.e. he is showing 9 non-genesis traits), we know that he passed non-genesis traits for all 9 traits. Therefore, starter Meridel passed the 7 genesis traits to Week 1 Kitten, as well as her hidden, non-genesis ear and whisker colour traits. Therefore, the only non-genesis hidden traits of Meridel's that we can learn about from this breeding are her hidden ear trait and her hidden whisker colour trait.

Let's examine each of these traits individually:

Ears: Week 1 Kitten is showing Mysterious ears. Her dad Lin is showing Rounded ears, and hides Odyssey Rounded Fold ears, or something more recessive. Looking at Saga's charts (https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B0_Wqb...iMDhm/edit), we can see that Mysterious ears are dominant to Rounded ears. Since Lin is showing Rounded ears, he could not have passed Mysterious ears (the most dominant ear he could have passed is his shown Rounded ear trait). Therefore, the Mysterious ear trait must have come from starter Meridel, and must be her hidden ear trait (she shows Genesis ears). So, we have discovered Meridel hides the Mysterious ear trait.

Whisker Colour: Week 1 Kitten is showing Black whiskers. Dad Lin is showing Black whiskers, and hides Chocolate whiskers, or something more recessive. If Meridel was hiding White or 2 Tone Black & White whiskers, Week 1 Kitten would be showing either White or 2 Tone Black & White whiskers, since those traits are dominant to Lin's shown Black whiskers. Therefore, Meridel must have passed Black whiskers, or a more recessive whisker colour, to Week 1 Kitten. Lin may have passed his shown Black whiskers, or Meridel may hide Black whiskers and passed them, and it is even possible that both parents passed Black whiskers to Week 1 Kitten; we don't know at this point. Thus, all we can say about Meridel's hidden whisker colour at this point is that it is Black or more recessive.

As we go through the project, I will give you exercises to make you think. Here is the first one!

Exercise: Suppose that Lin hides Chocolate whiskers (he may hide something more recessive, but let's make it simple ). What possible shown whisker colours could we see in future breedings between Meridel and Lin? The answer will be provided at the end of this post.

So, Week 1 Kitten has revealed one of Meridel's hidden traits (the hidden ear trait), and given us a hint about a second one (the hidden whisker colour trait). This kitten is unlikely to give us any more information about Meridel that she already has, so we won't unpack her.

At this point, I'd just like to give a few basic pointers about dealing with starters as the 2015 Fall Creepy Collection starters have their first kittens.

First of all, remember that patience is a virtue. It's very unlikely that you'll learn everything about your starters in one or two breedings. In fact, the most recessive traits often take more than a month to discover (when I discovered Swanky whiskers (the most recessive whisker shape at the time), it took 5 breedings to discover, and I consider myself VERY lucky that it happened that quickly). Probably the single biggest reason that people give up on working with starters is that they get frustrated with not getting answers quickly. Be patient!

Secondly, pay attention. Look at the pedigrees of each breeding carefully. Pay special attention when a starter's kitten shows a trait that is the same as, or more recessive than, the shown trait of the non-starter parent (for example, the Black whiskers in Week 1 Kitten hint that whisker colour is a a trait of Meridel's that will bear watching in the weeks ahead).

Thirdly, don't be afraid to change direction if you think it is more likely to give you a better result. In the weeks ahead, I plan to cover different breeding techniques like backbreeding and sibling breeding. Don't be afraid to switch when the situation calls for it.

Finally, if you make a mistake, don't be too hard on yourself. We all make them lol. Just learn what you can from your mistake and move on.

If you have any comments, suggestions or questions, feel free!

To summarize: after the first breeding, we now know that Meridel hides Mysterious ears, and whiskers that are Black, or a more recessive colour.

Exercise Answer: Starter Meridel has Silver whiskers showing, and hides Black whiskers, or something more recessive. Non-starter Lin shows Black whiskers, and for the sake of this exercise, we suppose that he hides Chocolate whiskers. If Meridel passes her shown Silver whisker, the resulting kitten will have Silver whiskers showing (Silver is the most dominant whisker colour). If Meridel passes her hidden whisker colour, and Lin passes his shown Black whisker, the resulting kitten will have Black whiskers showing (Meridel hides a whisker colour that is Black or more recessive). If Lin passes his hidden whisker colour (which we are assuming is Chocolate solely for this exercise), and Meridel hides Black or Blonde Streaked whiskers, the resulting kitten's shown whisker colour would be Black or Blonde Streaked, respectively. If Lin hides Chocolate whiskers, and Meridel hides a whisker colour recessive to Blonde Streaked, Meridel's hidden whisker colour would be Chocolate or more recessive, and the resulting kitten would show Chocolate whiskers. Therefore, if Lin hides Chocolate whiskers, kittens produced by Meridel and Lin would show one of four whisker colours: Silver, Black, Blonde Streaked, or Chocolate.

I'd like to make 3 additional points about this answer. First, if Lin hides a more recessive whisker colour, there are other possible resulting shown whisker colours. Secondly, it would be a major surprise if Lin hid either Dusky or Flame whiskers, since Lin's pedigree traces back to cats born before either of those colours were discovered (of course, Meridel could hide either of these). Finally, if Meridel hides Blonde Streaked whiskers, we have a chance of the Meridel- Lyn pairing giving us a clear answer on its own. If Meridel hides any of the other possible colours she could hide (Black, Chocolate, or something recessive to Chocolate), we will need to change things up to get a clear answer on the whisker colour.

Let's start by taking a look at the second kitten from Lin and Meridel:



This time, starter Meridel passed 3 of her hidden non-genesis traits (eye colour, ear, and whisker colour traits), and passed genesis traits for the other 6 traits. Two of these traits (the ears and whisker colour) are the same ones she passed last week, and yielded the same shown traits as last week. So, nothing new learned from those two traits; as we learned last week, Meridel hides the Mysterious ear trait, and hides Black whiskers or a more recessive whisker colour. Let's take a closer look at the hidden trait Meridel passed this week that she didn't pass last week, namely her eye colour.

Eye Colour: Week 2 Kitten is showing Serenity eyes. Week 2 Kitten's non-starter father Lin has Mercury eyes as his shown eye. Checking Saga's charts (https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B0_Wqb...iMDhm/edit), we can see that Serenity eyes are dominant to Mercury eyes. Since Lin is showing Mercury eyes, he can't be hiding Serenity eyes, so the Serenity eye colour trait must have come from her mother Meridel, and therefore Serenity is Meridel's hidden eye (remember that starter Meridel's shown eye is Genesis Odyssey). We will leave this kitten in the box for now.

I'm going to conclude this post with by considering Meridel's hidden whisker colour and what the plan is around it, with a bit of a side discussion of 3 common breeding techniques used with starters (in fact, with any cat with unknown hidden traits). So far, we know that her hidden whisker colour is Black or more recessive. We also know that Lin shows Black whiskers, and hides Chocolate whiskers or a more recessive whisker colour. At this point, we will keep her with Lin until we learn more about her unknown hidden traits. Where we go once we decide to switch our approach depends on what Meridel's future breedings with Lin yield.

Right now we are are basically using the direct approach (a technique sometimes call a "direct pull" technique, even though the trait isn't technically "pulled" (it would be more accurately described as the "hide behind" technique)). In this approach, we breed a starter with a non-starter with recessive traits, and if the starter is hiding traits dominant to what the non-starter has, we learn the starter's hiddens when the starter passes them. So far, this technique has already successfully shown us Meridel's hidden eye colour and ear traits, and may yet work for Meridel's hidden whisker colour if Meridel hides Blonde-Streaked whiskers and passes them at the same time as Lin passes his hidden whisker (Chocolate is recessive to Blonde-Streaked, and since Lin hides Chocolate or more recessive, a kitten of Lin's and Meridel's would show Blonde-Streaked if Meridel hides Blonde-Streaked and both pass their hidden whisker colour). We will also use this technique, but with a non-starter with a more recessive shown whisker colour than Black, if we continue to get nothing but Silver or Black whisker colour showing on Meridel's and Lin's kittens, or if the only male kittens we get from Meridel and Lin show Chocolate whiskers or more recessive whisker colour.

Exercise: Why might the two techniques I'm about to cover next (back breeding and sibling breeding) not yield helpful results if we try to use them when all of Meridel's and Lin's kittens show Silver or Black whiskers, or if the only male kittens we get show Chocolate whiskers or something more recessive? Answer at the end of this post (if you're unfamiliar with back breeding or sibling breeding, you may need to wait until after I describe these techniques to figure this answer out ).

The direct technique is generally the fastest method to discover a hidden trait, as long as the non-starter's trait is recessive enough, which is why it is the preferred technique of most breeders when possible. If you don't have an available cat to breed with the starter with a sufficiently recessive trait in the trait in question, you'll need to use another method (or acquire a cat with a recessive enough trait).

If the direct technique isn't an option, there are two other techniques that breeders commonly use: back breeding and sibling breeding. The techniques are very similar. (Note that these techniques are definitely NOT something you should do with RL cats!)

Back breeding involves breeding a kitten of a starter of the opposite gender to the starter that is known to hide the starter's mystery trait back to the starter. Then you wait until the starter and the kitten both pass their hiddens in the same breeding. You will end up with a pure version (i.e. the hidden is the same as the shown) of the trait that the starter is hiding, and thus you will be able to tell what the starter hides by what is showing. This technique is a bit more resource-efficient than sibling breeding, but often yields cats with more genesis traits showing and hiding than sibling breeding does. It is usually slower to give a clear answer than the direct approach (the direct approach has a 50% chance of giving an answer if the non-starter's shown trait is recessive enough (it will only depend upon the starter passing the hidden in this case), while back breeding depends on both parents passing hiddens, which has only a 25% chance of happening). Back breeding also requires a kitten of the starter that hides the trait in question and is of the opposite gender of the starter (back breeding is not yet an option for learning Meridel's whisper colour, even if we wanted to, simply because both of Meridel's kittens thus far are females, as is Meridel). We may consider this option later.

Sibling breeding is similar to back breeding, but instead of breeding the starter with the kitten, this approach involves breeding 2 kittens of the starter of opposite genders to each other that hide the trait in question together. The desired result is the same as what would be desired from a back breed; both parents passing their hiddens of the trait in question, which would again yield a pure version of the starter's hidden trait. This requires 2 of the starter's kittens instead of the one required for back breeding, but will generally yield more traity kittens than back breeding would, simply because the kitten of a starter and a non-starter, will be guaranteed to at least be hiding as many traits as the non-starter parent shows, and will show at least one trait, and may well show more, while a starter has no shown non-genesis traits and as few as 6 hidden non-genesis traits. In the case of Meridel's whisker colour, we would likely get better kittens sibling breeding a male hiding Meridel's whisker colour to Week 2 Kitten than we would get by back breeding that male to Meridel. This is another option we may consider later.

Of course, it may even be desirable to use more than one of these techniques at the same time, or use the same technique with more than one pairing. Let the circumstances dictate.

In, short: the direct method is generally quickest if a starter partner with the right traits is available, while back breeding is usually slower to give an answer, may give an answer when the direct approach doesn't (but often gives low-traited kittens), and sibling breeding is similar to back breeding, but requires unpacking one more kitten, and generally gives more traity kittens than back breeding.

After Meridel's first 2 breedings, we know that she hides Serenity eyes, Mysterious ears and a whisker colour that is Black or more recessive. Hopefully we'll learn more from the next breeding!

Exercise Answer: If all of the kittens which carry Meridel's hidden whisker colour show Black whiskers, we have to consider the possibility that Meridel hides Black whiskers. If she does, back breeding a male showing Black whiskers to Meridel will give a kitten showing Black whiskers EVERY time Meridel's hidden whisker colour passes and a sibling breed will give either Black whiskers, or possibly Lin's hidden whisker colour (if both of the siblings hid Lin's hidden whisker colour and passed it). However, we won't know whether Meridel hides Black whiskers, or whether she hides something else, and we simply have the bad luck of the male passing the shown Black whisker that he got from Lin. This could be a major dead end, and definitely happens if you're not careful.

If the only males we get hiding Meridel's whisker colour show Chocolate whiskers or something more recessive, we need to consider the possibility that Meridel's hidden and Lin's hidden are the same. If they are, we would be in the situation where any kitten's that hid Meridel's whisker colour would show Lin's hidden whisker, and we wouldn't know if it was the same as Meridel's, or just bad luck.

The only time I would sibling breed in either of the situations above is if I had extremely good luck, and had 2 outstanding siblings of opposite genders to breed together, in which case any answer I got on the whisker colour would be a bonus (I would probably use another technique on the starter or one of the starter's kittens to get an answer though).

Let's take a look at starter Meridel's third kitten with Lin:



This time, Meridel passed 4 non-genesis traits and genesis traits for the other 5 traits (being a 9-traiter, Lin always passes non-genesis traits). 2 of the non-genesis traits she passed are ones we've seen before (Serenity eye colour and Mysterious ears). Let's talk about the other two.

Week 3 Kitten has Mysterious eye shape showing. There are only 2 known eye shapes: Curious eye shape, which is the genesis eye shape, and Mysterious eye shape, which is the non-genesis eye shape, which is recessive to Curious. Since Mysterious eye shape is showing on Week 3 Kitten, Meridel must hide Mysterious eye shape.

Week 3 Kitten also has Small pupils. There are only 2 known pupil sizes: Big pupil, which is the genesis pupil size, and Small pupil, which is the non-genesis pupil size, which is recessive to Big. Therefore, since Week 3 Kitten has Small pupils, Meridel must hide Small pupil size.

I'd like to make a few comments about this result. The first is that Week 3 Kitten has what are commonly called "perfect" eyes. A cat is said to have perfect eyes if the shown eye colour, eye shape and pupil size are all non-genesis. Week 3 Kitten would typically be described as having perfect Serenity eyes.

The second point is that, since there are only 2 eye shapes and 2 pupil sizes, these 2 traits are relatively easy to breed into a line if your starter doesn't have them, but you want them in the line. So don't be too concerned if your starter doesn't hide one or both of them.

Lastly, and in my opinion, most importantly, I'd like to point out that there are many people who prefer Curious eye shape to Mysterious, and others who prefer Mysterious eyes to Curious eyes. There are also many who prefer Big pupils to Small pupils, and others who prefer Small pupils to Big pupils. In fact, you will find people out there who like genesis versions of certain traits, or may like certain dominant traits, or maybe recessive ones. The point is that pretty much any trait or combination of traits has its fans, so don't get too lost in what other people are breeding; breed what YOU like. No doubt, there are others who like what you like. Of course, the most recessive traits and new traits will usually be popular, but people will like what they like anyways.

To summarize what we have learned about Meridel's hidden traits so far: Meridel hides Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious ears, and a whisker colour that is Black or more recessive.

I wonder what we'll get next breeding (hopefully we start getting some male kittens soon lol)!

Let's take a look at starter Meridel's 4th kitten with Lin:



This time we were a bit fortunate! Meridel passed 5 of her hidden non-genesis traits. 3 of them (eye colour, ears and whisker colour) are ones she has passed before, so I won't cover them in detail this week. However, she also passed 2 non-genesis traits she hadn't passed previously (tail and whisker shape). Let's examine these results more closely.

Tail: Week 4 Kitten shows Mysterious tail. Lin shows Curious tail and is known to hide Posh tail. Therefore Lin could not have passed Mysterious tail to Week 4 Kitten, so it must have come from Meridel, and so Mysterious must be her hidden tail trait.

Whiskers: Week 4 Kitten shows Curious whiskers. Non-starter Lin also shows Curious whiskers. Therefore, all we know about the hidden whisker shape that Meridel passed is that she hides Curious whiskers or a more recessive whisker shape.

Week 4 Kitten is a rather good offspring to work with, and if we ever get a similar male from Meridel, may be a good candidate for sibling breeding down the line. For the moment though, we will keep her packed up.

Exercise Question: Week 4 Kitten carries both of Meridel's hidden whisker traits. Why not put a cat with recessive whiskers with her and get answers that way? Answer at the end of this post.

An important part of working with starters is re-assessing your approach each week. Up to this point, Lin has been a useful partner for Meridel in learning her hidden traits. We have learned 5 of Meridel's hiddens (the 3 eye traits, tail and ears), and have minimum boundaries for 2 others (the 2 whisker traits). Meridel may or may not hide a non-genesis shade, and shades are generally not as high a priority for most people (especially since the starter may not hide a non-genesis one). So that leaves the hidden fur as the only trait where Lin is likely to give us a definitive answer (we may get more info about the 2 whisker traits if Lin passes his hiddens at the right time, but we may not). Therefore, I've decided that the time to switch away from Lin to another partner for Meridel is coming soon. In fact, Lin will breed with Meridel one more time (maybe we'll get lucky and Meridel will pass her fur this time), and then we will switch Meridel's partner to a cat that is more likely to give us answers on Meridel's unknown hiddens (I think I have another project for Lin hehe).

My preference for a project like this would be to use back breeding or sibling breeding as a way to try and learn more about those whisker traits, as a way to demonstrate more about breeding techniques, but that is not an option here for 2 reasons, one obvious and one less obvious. The less obvious reason ties into the answer to the exercise question, so I will talk about it then. The obvious reason is that starter Meridel is female, and all of her kittens thus far have been female, so it isn't possible to breed any of them together.

To summarize what we know about Meridel's non-genesis hiddens after this week's result: Meridel hides Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious tail, Mysterious ears, Black or more recessive whisker colour, and Curious or more recessive whisker shape.

Hopefully we'll find out something about Meridel's hidden fur next breeding!

Exercise Answer: Breeding Week 4 Kitten with a male with very recessive whisker traits is an option in this situation, but it isn't one where I like the odds at this point. We have to consider the possibility that Meridel hides Black and/or Curious whiskers. If she does, then Week 4 Kitten may well have pure whiskers, or may have whisker traits where the shown is actually from Meridel and the hidden is from Lin (Lin is known to hide at least Chocolate and at least Frazzled whiskers). Both of these situations will give confusing results. If Meridel was from the latest release of starters, I might be more willing to gamble on putting Week 4 Kitten with a male with recessive whiskers and see if I can get a previously undiscovered or very new trait out of it, but since Meridel is an older release, it is highly unlikely she hides anything new. If back breeding or sibling breeding had been possible with Meridel and her kittens thus far, I wouldn't have gone that route for the same reasons; there is too much likelihood of a confusing result and not enough potential reward.

Time to look at Meridel's 5th kitten (which will be her final one with Lin... I'll talk about Meridel's new partner shortly):



This kitten is showing only one non-genesis trait (Black whisker colour), and this is a result we have had in previous weeks, so we haven't learned anything new. The good news is that this kitten is a male! That means that if we don't get a clear answer about Meridel's whisker colour from other means, we do have the option of back breeding or sibling breeding this kitten with one known to carry Meridel's hidden whisker colour. For now though, we'll leave him in the box, and wait and see if we need to unpack him.

At this point, I would like to introduce Meridel's new partner, Amaud! Here is his pedigree:



Amaud is an 8-traited cat, showing non-genesis traits everywhere except for Shade, and he hides at least Glitter shade. What makes Amaud really useful for what we are trying to do here though, is that he is showing the 2nd most recessive fur known currently (Australian Mist - Blue Marble), the 2nd most recessive whisker colour (Latte), and a decently recessive whisker shape (Light Wave). Remember, the 3 non-genesis traits that we know Meridel hides that we still haven't clearly identified are her hidden fur, her hidden whisker colour and her hidden whisker shape. Clearly, this cat has a solid chance of helping us out with this, as long as Meridel cooperates (she still hasn't passed her hidden fur at all).

That's it for this week. Hopefully Meridel will pass the traits we need her to pass now that she's with Amaud!

To summarize what we know about Meridel's non-genesis hiddens after this week's result: Meridel hides Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious tail, Mysterious ears, Black or more recessive whisker colour, and Curious or more recessive whisker shape.

Time to take a look at starter Meridel's first breeding with Amaud, her sixth breeding overall:



This time Meridel passed 4 of her hidden non-genesis traits, 3 of which we already knew about (Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, and Mysterious tail). Let's take a look at the other non-genesis trait she passed: her fur.

Fur: It took 6 weeks, but Meridel finally passed her fur! Week 6 Kitten shows Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 fur. Her dad Amaud shows Australian Mist - Blue Marble fur, which is recessive to Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2. Therefore, Amaud since Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 can't be hiding behind Amaud's shown fur, Week 6 Kitten must have got his shown fur from Meridel. Thus, Meridel's shown fur must be Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2.

I would just like to make one comment about this result. We stuck with Lin for 5 weeks without learning what Meridel's hidden fur was, but that doesn't mean that Lin was a bad choice for learning what Meridel's hidden fur was. On the contrary, Lin's shown Aby Fawn fur would have hidden behind Meridel's hidden Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 fur, if she only would have passed it. Her not passing it in her breedings with Lin was simply a matter of bad luck.

Breeding KittyCatS! definitely has an element of luck to it. Every time KittyCatS! breed, each parent will randomly pass to its kitten(s) either its shown or its hidden trait for each of the 9 traits that KittyCatS! have. I have no reason to believe that the traits that one parent has have any effect on whether the other parent passes shown or hidden traits. Breeding with a parent with recessive traits might increase the chances of the other parent's traits being the shown traits of their kittens, but that's it. Sometimes you will have good luck, sometimes you will have bad luck; the best you can do is simply to be patient, and partner your cats in a way that gives you the best chance of benefiting from good luck when you get it.

That's all for this week. Hopefully next week we'll learn more about Meridel's hidden whisker traits!

To summarize what we know about Meridel's non-genesis hiddens after this week's result: Meridel hides Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 fur, Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious tail, Mysterious ears, Black or more recessive whisker colour, and Curious or more recessive whisker shape.

Let's see what starter Meridel's seventh breeding (her second with Amaud) has to tell us. Keep in mind that we know everything about Meridel's hidden traits, except for her 2 whisker traits, and whether she hides a shade other than Natural (I'm not really concerned about whether the shade is hiding, but it's a bonus if we get one). Here is the pedigree for Week 7 Kitten:



Week 7 Kitten is showing 4 non-genesis traits. We already know Meridel's non-genesis hiddens for 3 of these traits (Serenity eye colour, Mysterious eye shape and Mysterious ears). Let's take a closer look at the other trait Week 7 Kitten is showing:

Whisker Colour: Week 7 Kitten is showing Black whiskers. Non-starter Amaud has Latte whiskers showing. According to Saga's charts, Latte is recessive to Black, so Amaud can't be hiding Black whiskers. Therefore, Week 7 Kitten must have got her shown Black whiskers from Meridel, so Meridel must be hiding Black whiskers.

This result isn't terribly unexpected. In previous weeks with her original partner Lin, Meridel passed her hidden whisker colour a few times, and every time, a Black whisker ended up showing. Since Lin showed Black whiskers and hides at least Chocolate, we couldn't rule out him passing Black whiskers every time (one of the reasons we switched to Amaud), but there was a good chance that he passed his hidden whisker colour at least once. Since all of his kittens with Meridel that showed non-Silver whiskers showed Black, I suspected that she hid Black, but I still had to prove it by breeding Meridel to a cat that had whiskers that were clearly recessive to Black.

So now there's only one unknown hidden among the hidden traits that Meridel is known to hide: her whisker shape. This is a bit more of a mystery than the whisker colour was, since she has only passed her hidden whisker shape once in her first 7 breedings. Hopefully she passes it again in week 8!

To summarize what we know about Meridel's non-genesis hiddens after this week's result: Meridel hides Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 fur, Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious tail, Mysterious ears, Black whisker colour, and a Curious or more recessive whisker shape.

Time to check out starter Meridel's eighth kitten, which is her third with Amaud, remembering that our main goal has been to learn as much as possible about the 6 hidden traits Meridel possesses that she is guaranteed to hide as a KittyCatS! starter, as well as learning if she hides non-genesis versions of any of the other 3 traits that she may or may not hide. Recall that we have already discovered all of Meridel's guaranteed non-genesis hiddens except for her hidden whisker shape, and that she hides non-genesis for at least 2 of the 3 other traits (eye shape and pupil size) (we don't yet know if Meridel hides a shade):



Week 8 Kitten has 2 non-genesis traits showing: Mysterious eye shape and Mysterious tail. We already learned in previous weeks that Meridel hides Mysterious eye shape and Mysterious tail, so this result tells us nothing new about Meridel. We'll have to wait until next time to see if we can learn more about Meridel's hidden whisker shape then.

So we know no more about Meridel this week than we did last week. To summarize what we know about Meridel's non-genesis hiddens: Meridel hides Chateau Cat - Grey & White No. 2 fur, Serenity eyes, Mysterious eye shape, Small pupils, Mysterious tail, Mysterious ears, Black whisker colour, and a Curious or more recessive whisker shape.