Are any cats sterile?

Question

What I mean is, without the need for a neutering operation, are there any cats that are unable to conceive, because they were born that way or whatever other reason, and how does one find out?

Answer 1

dont know how you find out babe but all living things can be born sterile.

Answer 2

I thought mine was for 10 1/2 years. Then this past year, she ended up being pregnant. Had one stillborn and had to surgically remove a dead ball of kitties from inside her.

She went into heat for a few years, but was always kept inside. She has been pretty much and indoor/outdoor cat for the last 7 years.

I had decided that she must be sterile after all these years. She was a great momma to all the other kitties though. She loved kittens and she helped other mommies taking care of them.

The vet couldn't understand it either. She said that she had never seen anything like it. It seemed that she was sterile for 10 years and then pregnant out of nowhere. So, she had to get spayed at 10 1/2 years old. I don't know if there is a test to find out or not?

Answer 3

Female calico [tortie] cats aren't sterile, it's the male ones that usually are. Male calico cats are very rare due to the chromosomes involved in defining gender.
But don't take a chance, always neuter your cats at around 8 months old. That way, you avoid a whole lot of problems.

Answer 4

If Its cat you are after that's sterile ,Why don't you just do the decent thing and give a cat a home from one of the many rescue centres and spend a wee bit of money on it and have it spayed or neutered its a one off expense !Most centres theses days have cats desperate for a home and the centre usually either neuter or spay the cats prior to rehoming!....>^..^<..( no more problems reproducing!)


Is there a particular reason for wanting to know?



Happy New Year

Answer 5

Hi there...male calicos, which are a rarity are generally born sterile and male hybrid cat breeds who are offsprings from an exotic cat will also be sterile. However all still produce the hormones which will cause spraying behaviours once they reach the age of sexual maturity between 5-7 months.

Article about sterile male calicos: http://www.messybeast.com/mosaicism.htm (See section TORTOISESHELL AND CALICO TOMCATS)
1996 - 2005 By Sarah Hartwell
Every so often I am asked if a tortoiseshell or calico tomcat is valuable. You will find advertisements on the web, or in newspapers, placed by people hoping to sell a tortoiseshell tomcat for a large sum of money. One website even said that if you found a tortoiseshell tomcat, you could sell it for a fortune and retire!

Despite their rarity, tortoiseshell tomcats are not valuable in the financial sense. They have scientific value. Those that are fertile cannot pass on the tortoiseshell colour - you cannot breed more tortoiseshell males from them. As pets they are just like any other cat. As pedigree cats, there may be no colour class for them to enter so however fine they look, so they may be unable to win prizes (some breeds/shows have an "Any Other Colour" class). The abnormalities which have created a tortoiseshell male may also make him more susceptible to auto-immune disease or testicular tumours.

In short, if you have a tortoiseshell male cat, he is not going to make you rich! Even the minority of fertile tortie tomcats are not valuable in money terms because they don't breed true. So next time you see someone advertising a "rare tortie male" on Ebay, usenet or a bulletin board, you can wonder who is more gullible - the person expecting to make a fortune or the person who pays over-the-odds because they think the cat is going to make them a fortune!

Another myth about tortoiseshell male cats is that if an owner takes a tortie or calico cat to be spayed (quite reasonably believing it to be female) and it turns out to be a male which the vet then castrates, the owner is entitled to get the money back from the vet for unnecessarily neutering a cat which is already sterile. Even though a male calico is likely to be STERILE, he probably still has the male hormones which make him spray. Many owners of tortoiseshell males like to mate the cat once to see if he is fertile. With so many unwanted kittens in the world, please don't do this unless you are involved in a genuine research programme.

To understand what creates tortoiseshell and calico males, we first have to look at the genes for red and for tortoiseshell. The white areas of calico cats are caused by different genes and will be ignored. The tabby pattern is also caused by other gene. In this article, "ginger" also includes "ginger-and-white" (red bicolour) and "red tabby" (with or without white). "Tortoiseshell" also includes "tortoiseshell-and-white" (calico) and "tortoiseshell tabby" (torbie) (with or without white). Cream is a dilute version of red. Blue (grey) is a dilute version of black.

Answer 6

I am not sure what colour calico is when refering to cats. Is it a ginger/orange colour with cream coloured shadings?I've not heard the color calico used to describe a cat in Australia.
If so,then a female who is part long haired,very seldom concieves and produces young.
Have you noticed you rarely see a female ginger/cream cat with a longish/Persian type coat.But not of true Persian features!
It appears to be a genetic mutation,like true albino.
My mother only ever had this type of cat,they were always very small in comparison to other cats.
None ever produced kittens, though none were spayed.
When her last died,she found it very hard to get a replacement and could only get one through a show cat breeder.

Answer 7

MALE calcios are sterile....and very rare, but usually if you come across one, they are sterile. Also, there are male cats that have 2 retained testicles. They would probably be sterile also. The body temp is too high for sperm to survive. There are some female cats that are unable to concieve also. Due to some reproductive problem.

Answer 8

If a male cat is both orange and black, he is probably sterile. Both of these colors are carried on the female X chromosome that cats receive from their mother. Normal male cats only carry one X chromosome, so they can be orange or black, but not both. Under extremely rare circumstances however (1/3000), a male cat is born with an extra X chromosome (XXY), in which case it is possible for him to be both black and orange. This unusual combination of chromosomes, however, will almost certainly render the male cat sterile.

Answer 9

Aside from the aforementioned male calico (VERY rare to even see one though) you likely won't find a known sterile cat. And, sterile or not, they would still have the undesirable behaviors (spraying and such) as any other unneutered male cat

Answer 10

The only person who could tell you for sure would be your vet. I have read of some very rare breeds that have trouble with reproduction but that's why they are rare. For the most part if you have a cat assume that it will and can reproduce.

Answer 11

Calico colored FEMALE cats are not sterile. However, in the very rare occassion there is a MALE calico colored cat born..more than likely, it will be sterile. .