![]() ![]() The current record holder is Tiger, a 27-toed kitty from Alberta, Canada. If you are wondering, the most toes ever found on a cat, reported in 1974, was 32 toes, eight on each paw. Typically, cats have five toe beans on their front feet and four on their hind feet. Simply put, they are the paw pads that make up a cat’s foot. Casey Robinson, area medical director of IndeVets in Detroit, Michigan. These are found on both the front and rear paws, explains Dr. Like all kitty toenails, the extra ones require regular trimming. The technical term for toe beans is digital pads. The toenails associated with the extra toes tend to be normal nails, although the extra toe occasionally might be incompletely formed and the nail bed deformed, leading to claw problems like ingrown or overgrown nails. Polydactylism doesn’t affect cats adversely. Therefore, if one parent has extra toes, 50% of the kittens will have it too. A cat needs only one copy of the gene from either parent to have the trait. Cats with extra toes have the dominant gene PD. Genetically, polydactylism is a simple autosomal (unrelated to gender) dominant trait. Today, due to unrestrained breeding, nearly 50 of Snowball’s descendants still live at the Hemingway home in Key West, Florida. The latter name refers to the author Ernest Hemingway, who was given his first polydactyl cat, Snowball, by a ship’s captain and drinking buddy. Polydactyl cats are sometimes referred to as “mitten cats,” or “Hemmingway cats”. It has been said that there are fewer polydactyl cats in Europe because many of these cats were considered witches’ familiars and hence destroyed. They were also thought to be better mousers. They found their way onto boats, their extra toes giving them added balance on ships in stormy weather. Polydactyl cats were thought to be lucky by sailors. Turn heads with one of kind CATISS cat paw design lip balm, a deep nourishing beeswax based lip balm moisturize and soften lips, this Original Pure. The offspring of these cats are believed to have then travelled on trading ships from Boston to Halifax, which could explain why these areas have higher than normal incidence of polydactyly. It is believed that English Puritans might have taken polydactyl cats on their ships to Boston during the mid-1600s. Being a Lunenburger, I was especially delighted to find that there is a maritime connection involving these fascinating cats. Doing some research, I found out there is indeed a higher incidence of polydactyl cats in the Northeastern US, Halifax, and a pocket in England and Wales. Having practiced as a veterinarian in Ontario for several years before returning to my native Nova Scotia, I was intrigued by what appeared to be many more polydactyl cats in our region. It is a genetic mutation that causes cats to be born with more than the usual number of toes on one or more of its paws. She has a congenital physical anomaly called polydactyly (Greek for ‘many digits’). My cat, Mandy Pawtinkin, is blessed with 22 toes. Most cats have 18 toes five toes on each of their front feet, and four on the back. ![]()
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