Is having a black cat good or bad?

There iris heterochromia is the term used to describe an anatomical variant that causes having one eye of one color and the other of a different shadepeculiarity quite possible to find in the cats. A high percentage have one blue eye and one green, or amber, or brown eye.

This condition is not unique to cats, and also occurs in other animals such as dogs, horses, cows or rabbits, and even, although rarely, it also happens in human beings, as in the famous singer David Bowie.

It is a condition caused by the combination of genes that affect the pigmentation. Generally, in the case of black and white cats, and this occurs when the dominant genes are those for the white color or when the genes responsible for the white spots themselves are the dominant ones.

When one of these two conditions occurs, the granules of melanin they do not reach each eye at the same stage of cat development.

After a few weeks of life, the melanin moves to the iris giving pigmentation to the eyes and generating the change in eye color. green, amber or brown, regardless of the final color of both eyes.

In cats with complete heterochromia, Only one eye receives melanin, causing the cat to have one blue, melanin-free or depigmented eye, and the other eye one of the colors indicated by its genome.

Occasionally, melanin travels to the iris and the cat may show one eye that is partly blue and the other another color. This state is called partial heterochromia.

This condition usually occurs in cats that are all white or have extensive white markings, and very rarely in cats that are black or have no white fur.

Commonly, those who suffer from heterochromia are called total or partial zarcos. Unlike dogs or humans, cats eyes are always light colored and one eye is almost always blue.

Although heterochromia itself it is not an illness Since it is just a genetic disease that does not require any kind of medical treatment, sometimes, It is associated with intractable congenital deafness.

Very recent studies indicate that there is a higher percentage of lack of hearing in completely white cats with both blue eyes than in those with heterochromia.

The ace cells In the inner ear, the sensitive cells responsible for hearing are pigment cells. Since cats are white and have blue eyes, pigmentation does not develop in them, so the animal suffers from deafness.

Heterochromia does not develop over the life of the cat, it is born with this condition. However, there are some eye conditions caused by the inflammation of the iris, physical injury, or certain medications which can cause changes in the pigmentation of the eye.

This iris color change always requires a veterinary consultation to indicate the appropriate treatment since he is still pathological.

*Prof Dr Juan Enrique Romero @drromerook is a veterinarian. University education specialist. Master in Psychoimmunoneuroendocrinology. Former director of the Hospital Escuela de Animales Pequeños (UNLPam). University professor in various Argentine universities. International speaker.

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