big cats into small cats - selective breeding?

"Ted Davis" <tdavis.TakeThisOut@gearbox.maem.umr.edu> wrote in message
news:um23h09jvvlhubgmat4o2umpt57pubrt0i@4ax.com...
> On Wed, 4 Aug 2004 10:31:43 -0700, "Cat Lover" <catlover485.TakeThisOut@aol.com>
> wrote:
>
> >I'd love to have a lion or tiger that was the size of a house cat.
> >
> >Would it be possible to get one with selective breeding? Take the
smallest
> >of each litter and use it to breed even smaller cats until you get to the
> >right size? If so, how long would it take? I'm guessing well over a
century,
> >if not much longer.
>
> Probably never. Cats are not genetically plastic - people have been
> breeding domestic cats for several thousand years and have not managed
> to make much difference in them: coat colors and length, some tail
> deformities, and that hideous crushed face on some long hair breeds
> are about it. Large males can be about four times the weight of small
> females whereas with more plastic animals like dogs, breeds vary in
> weight by a range of something like twenty to one.

How do you explain the difference in size between a lion and a tabby? They
both supposedly come from the same line. Why can't selective breeding
accomplish the same thing?
 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

On Thu, 5 Aug 2004 11:16:58 -0700, "hunkahunkaburninluv"
<some RemoveThis @where.come> wrote:

>
>"Ted Davis" <tdavis RemoveThis @gearbox.maem.umr.edu> wrote in message
>news:um23h09jvvlhubgmat4o2umpt57pubrt0i@4ax.com...
>> On Wed, 4 Aug 2004 10:31:43 -0700, "Cat Lover" <catlover485 RemoveThis @aol.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >I'd love to have a lion or tiger that was the size of a house cat.
>> >
>> >Would it be possible to get one with selective breeding? Take the
>smallest
>> >of each litter and use it to breed even smaller cats until you get to the
>> >right size? If so, how long would it take? I'm guessing well over a
>century,
>> >if not much longer.
>>
>> Probably never. Cats are not genetically plastic - people have been
>> breeding domestic cats for several thousand years and have not managed
>> to make much difference in them: coat colors and length, some tail
>> deformities, and that hideous crushed face on some long hair breeds
>> are about it. Large males can be about four times the weight of small
>> females whereas with more plastic animals like dogs, breeds vary in
>> weight by a range of something like twenty to one.
>
>How do you explain the difference in size between a lion and a tabby? They
>both supposedly come from the same line. Why can't selective breeding
>accomplish the same thing?

We are talking about more or less human time scales, not millions of
years and dozens if not hundreds or thousands of mutations.


T.E.D. (tdavis@gearbox.maem.umr.edu)
SPAM filter: Messages to this address *must* contain "T.E.D."
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 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

On 05 Aug 2004, kaeli wrote:

> In article <2nckrbFv7ghqU1.TakeThisOut@uni-berlin.de>, catlover485.TakeThisOut@aol.com
> enlightened us with...
>> I'd love to have a lion or tiger that was the size of a house cat.
>>
>
> Get a Bengal. ;)
>

I have one of those!

I've always wanted a cat and one day when looking through breeds of cat I
saw a Bengal. Read about it and fell in love with the breed. Then a friend
of a woman my wife works with was giving hers away because she was moving
to a place that didn't allow pets. So we got ourselves a Bengal called
Poomba.

He's a very vocal cat and loves nothing more than to fight you for
pleasure. Many a time my wife has looked round to see what the noise was
only to find me with a Bengal wrapped around my arm with my fist in his
purring mouth! He's never drawn blood and always ends the fight session
with a head butt.

But when he's lonely he gives out this cry that sounds like a person
calling out. It freaks out guests sometimes but he's just being him.

Bengals become domestic at the fourth generation of breeding between an
Asian leopard and a domestic cat. Poomba is a fourth generation and he
still has a lot of wild cat in the way he acts.

I'd love to get another Bengal as a friend for him. He needs someone to
play with all day.

He doesn't look like a leopard at all unless you roll him over and see his
belly full of spots. But he does have the softest fur you have ever felt.

Take a look at a Bengal. You'll never regret getting one! :-)

I've posted pictures under the subject "Poomba" in
alt.binaries.pictures.animals for anyone who wants to see him.

--
Alex Devlin

Good friends will bail you out of jail...
... True friends will be sitting there with you saying "Damn. That was
fun!"
 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

hunkahunkaburninluv wrote:
> "Ted Davis" <tdavis DeleteThis @gearbox.maem.umr.edu> wrote in message
> news:um23h09jvvlhubgmat4o2umpt57pubrt0i@4ax.com...

>> Probably never. Cats are not genetically plastic - people have been
>> breeding domestic cats for several thousand years and have not
>> managed to make much difference in them: coat colors and length,
>> some tail deformities, and that hideous crushed face on some long
>> hair breeds are about it. Large males can be about four times the
>> weight of small females whereas with more plastic animals like dogs,
>> breeds vary in weight by a range of something like twenty to one.
>
> How do you explain the difference in size between a lion and a tabby?
> They both supposedly come from the same line. Why can't selective
> breeding accomplish the same thing?


You are confusing species with genus, Lions and domestic cats are in the
same genus, but are very different species that diverged in terms of
evolution hundreds of thousands if not millions of years ago.


--
Nik Simpson
 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

kaeli wrote:
> In article <jWzQc.1992$923.179@bignews1.bellsouth.net>,
> n_simpson DeleteThis @bellsouth.net enlightened us with...
>>
>> You are confusing species with genus, Lions and domestic cats are in
>> the same genus, but are very different species that diverged in
>> terms of evolution hundreds of thousands if not millions of years
>> ago.
>>
>
> <nitpick>
> Actually, they are the same species, different genus.
> Both are species Felidae.
> Lion: genus Panthera
> Domestic cat: genus Felis
> </nitpick>
>
That'll teach me to get fancy with latin :-)

--
Nik Simpson
 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

On Fri, 6 Aug 2004 08:33:56 -0500, kaeli <tiny_one DeleteThis @NOSPAM.comcast.net>
wrote:

>In article <jWzQc.1992$923.179@bignews1.bellsouth.net>,
>n_simpson@bellsouth.net enlightened us with...
>>
>> You are confusing species with genus, Lions and domestic cats are in the
>> same genus, but are very different species that diverged in terms of
>> evolution hundreds of thousands if not millions of years ago.
>>
>
><nitpick>
>Actually, they are the same species, different genus.
>Both are species Felidae.
>Lion: genus Panthera
>Domestic cat: genus Felis
></nitpick>

That's nonsense - you got it backwards: house cats and lions are in
different genuses - even different subfamilies - and therefore are
necessarily different species: lions are Panthera leo; domestic cats
are Felis silvestris catus, sometimes Felis catus. In full:
Animalia Chordata Mammalia Carnivora Felidae Pantherinae Panthera leo
and Animalia Chordata Mammalia Carnivora Felidae Felinae Felis
silvestris catus.



T.E.D. (tdavis@gearbox.maem.umr.edu)
SPAM filter: Messages to this address *must* contain "T.E.D."
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 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding? 

Is genetic engineering a possiblity? Find the genes in a domestic cat that
control size, snip them out and inser them into a tiger or lion?

Or the reverse? How about a lion sized tabby?
 >> Stay informed about: big cats into small cats - selective breeding?