Devon Rex cats come w bardzo wielu wariantach kolorystycznych and everyone will surely find a kitten in their favorite color.
Aby ułatwić określanie kolorów kotów (zarówno hodowcom jak i kupującym), zaczęto używać systemu EMS (Easy Mind System).
We would like to explain what the deal is with colours (and these EMS codes). And we have two options for this:
Spróbujemy najpierw wyjaśnić kod EMS dla laików i jak najprostszym językiem (so we apologise to the specialists for certain simplifications, and invite you to the advanced part further on the page).
The EMS code starts with a 3-letter abbreviation assigned to a given breed. Dla Devonów będzie to DRX.
Next after DRX you will see letters OR letters and digits (single or several groups). They specify very precisely kolor kota in many respects (colour as such, but also patterns, shades, but also eyes, etc.).
Finalnie kod EMS będziecie widzieli zarówno na rodowodach jak i przy opisach naszych kotów na stronie.
In very simple terms, you can find Devons in several main color varieties:
These are the main varieties, but of course there can be cats that are a mix of them. Plus there are a few details which, for simplicity, we will not discuss in this part (e.g. shading of the hair).
Teraz poniżej opiszemy każdą odmianę and we will show on drawings what it looks like + we will give examples of cats from our cattery in a given colour variety (the links will take you to a given cat's page, where you can see more of its photos).
Koty solid mają jednolity kolor na całym ciele. Mogą być w 9 kolorach podstawowych, które mają następujące literowe oznaczenia:
Note: Laypeople often describe a cat's colour as they see it – that's why a cat that is officially blue is in fact sometimes called and described as „grey”. Chocolate looks like „dark brown”, and cinnamon like „light brown”, lilac is a bit „cream / light grey”, etc.
Note: Kot white (unlike a point or a bicolour cat, which we'll get to in a moment) is a cat that has no other colour on its body (it's either an albino or a cat without colour – which, interestingly, can have coloured offspring). If any other colour appears on its body, then it's no longer a white cat (in that case see point and bicolour cats).
Przykład: Koty solidy u nas to np. Atena (DRX b – czekoladowa), Amber (DRX a – niebieska), Giga (DRX c – liliowa).
Point cats wyglądają jak białe/jasne, but have one of the above solid colours in 4 specific and very characteristic places – na łapkach, pyszczku, uszach i ogonie.
W kotach point istnieją 3 odmiany depending on the contrast (between the white and those places with colour), and they have liczbowe oznaczenia zaczynające się od cyfry 3:
The EMS code of a point cat consists of the base colour (a letter) and these two digits with a 3 in front.
Przykład: Koty pointy u nas to np. Faraday (DRX o 33 – point syjamski cynamonowy), H-Wenus (DRX a 33 – point syjamski niebieski), czy Bajka (DRX c 33 – point syjamski liliowy).
Kot „łaciaty” has some main colour, ale ma też dodatek białego koloru (plamy/łatki lub dużą część ciała). W zależności od amount of this white colour it has its 4 possible designations with a 0 in front:
Note: In Devons only these 4 designations of „patching” are possible (and probably the most numerous are those 09 „with an unspecified amount of white”), but in other breeds there are more of them.
The EMS code of a „patched” cat consists of the base colour (a letter) and these two digits with a 0 in front.
Przykład: Nasz Diament to DRX c 09 (liliowy z białym), Chmurka to DRX a 09 (niebieska z białym), Cookie to DRX a 09 (niebieski z białym).
Ciekawostka: Can you see the difference between a white cat (w), a point cat (3x) and a patched cat (0x)? A white one (w) must be biały w całości. A point (especially Siamese 33) may „seem” white, but it has those wyraźne kolory w określonych miejscach (paws, muzzle, ears, tail). A patched cat, (especially van 01) may seem like a white cat or a point, but pay attention gdzie on tą biel ma, a gdzie nie ma. I żeby zrobić to jeszcze ciekawszym, zobaczcie naszego Einsteina, który jest jednocześnie kotem point i „łaciatym” (ma kod DRX n 09 33) – how can you tell? He could not be a „pure” point, because he had white paws (i.e. white in the place where points have a specific solid colour).
Koty mogą mieć, poza kolorem podstawowym, również wzór / rysunek na futrze in the form of stripes, spots or other patterns. It then looks e.g. like the fur of a leopard or a tiger. Depending on the type of pattern, 5 options are possible, which are designated with a digit starting from 2:
The EMS code of a tabby cat consists of the base colour (a letter) and these two digits with a 2 in front.
Przykład: Nie mieliśmy jeszcze w naszej hodowli kociaka pręgowanego 🙂
Szylkretki to koty, które mają red colour mixed with one of the main colours. And depending on the main colour there is a different oznaczenie literowe:
Co ciekawe szylkretki to tylko kotki (kocury szylkrety mają defekt genetyczny i są bezpłodne).
Przykład: Deli to DRX f 09 (czarna szylkretka z białym) a Didi to DRX h 09 (a chocolate tortoiseshell with white). As you can see here there is a double combination – of tortoiseshell and „patching” (because both girls also had white as an additional colour).
Jak widzicie jest to dosyć prosty i intuicyjny sposób określania kolorów. You just have to remember that Devon Rex cats can also occur in a mixture of these elements – e.g. patched tortoiseshells, tabby with white, etc. But we will not complicate this any further 🙂
Jak na początkującego to chyba i tak bardzo dużo informacji. So here you can finish reading. Unless, that is, you want to find out more – then you can move on to the ADVANCED part (below).
However, with the explanation above you already know the basic colour options of Devons and should be able to:
*Ciekawostka: Determining a cat's colour with the EMS code isn't always so easy (especially in the first days/weeks of a cat's life, and especially for point cats, which can change colour over time, even up to 2 years). It takes some experience, and even then it may not be done perfectly (we too are sometimes not 100% sure and occasionally ask fellow breeders for their opinion). Either way, the colour must be determined by the breeder when registering the cat for a pedigree (and entering the specific EMS code – it is also included in our contracts). After the fact, you can also go to a show, where there is a special category called „colour determination”, where the judges (specialists) can actually confirm the cat's colour from the pedigree. It may also happen that the judges change the official colour of the cat on the pedigree, because they decide the breeder may have made a mistake!
If you want to find out much more about colours, their detailed designations and wszystkich odmianach kolorystycznych – now here is a description for you. Note – it will be longer and more detailed and technical.
It is a system created by the International Feline Federation (FIFe) for the easy identification of pedigree cats.
Kod EMS to kombinacja liter i cyfr, która opisuje cechy zewnętrzne kota and covers such elements as: breed, colour and its distribution on the body, eye colours, types of tail and ears. The full description is available na stronie FIFe.
Początek kodu oznacza rasę i pisany jest wielkimi literami (rasa Devon Rex w EMS to litery DRX), the further lower-case letters specify the dominant colour, and the numbers the patterns, varieties or distribution of the fur colours. Additionally, for some breeds a designation of the eye colour, tail length or ear shape is introduced.
Kod EMS (dla rasy Devon Rex!) składa się z elementów: DRX x(s/y) 0x 1x 2x 3x 6x
Note: the list below covers those EMS elements that are possible specifically for the Devon Rex breed. In other breeds additional elements may appear in the notation (e.g. the type of tail, ears or type of fur).
Uwaga: Autorką grafik zamieszczonych w treści poniżej jest Joumana Medlej, która wyraziła zgodę na ich użycie (więcej informacj below).
Można powiedzieć, że jest 8 podstawowych kolorów Devon Rex cats (6 in black-pigmented colours and an additional 2 red-pigmented colours). To this is added „kolor szylkret” (w 6 podstawowych odmianach) oraz finalnie kolor biały.
Onto this are then overlaid certain varieties, patterns or additions of white. We invite you to get acquainted with the details of this classification.
Uwaga: Zdarza się, że finalne wybarwienie kota może się zmienić do nawet 2 roku życia. This is especially visible in “point” cats, but other initial colours can also change slightly. Interestingly, there are several factors when cats can change colour: temperature (here again especially points), sun, nutrition, age and illness.
Note: These two colours (d and e) are not entirely solid colours, they always appear tabby (tabbies, described below in section 2x). Appropriate combining of genes can make it an illusion of a solid colour (reducing the contrast in the tabby pattern).
Note: Tortoiseshells are usually females. A male tortoiseshell has a genetic defect and will be infertile.
Uwaga 1: Kolor biały zdarza się bardzo rzadko. To albo albinos (a complete lack of pigment) or a white cat, which in fact is not a colour but a suppression of the colour genes. Because of this, and interestingly, white cats (not albinos) can have coloured kittens. There's a very high chance that white cats will have different-coloured eyes (the technical name is heterochromia).
Note 2: There are also often kittens that look almost „white” (the vast majority of their body is white) with a distinct colour on the nose, paws, ears and tail. But then their colour officially is NOT white, but indicates the base colour (above) plus an addition called „point” (described below).
U niektórych kotów każdy włos zabarwiony jest tylko częściowo (w górnej części włosa, kolorem podstawowym), a w części dolnej jest pozbawiony barwnika – and it can look white (Silver) or yellowish (Golden).
To distinguish such a colouring, to the letter denoting the base colour dodajemy jeden z dwóch wyróżników:
Natomiast dopisek s lub y występuje zawsze z kolorem podstawowym, bo on zawsze występuje na czubku włosa.
Note: We often call such cats smoke, however it is a bit more complicated, because the coloured section of the hair can vary and the above designate the s/y colour for us if włos zabarwiony jest więcej niż w 50%/połowie. If the colouring is smaller, the terms shaded and shell appear (11 and 12 – described in the section „Zonal colouring of the hair” below).
Określamy tylko, jeśli kot posiada dodatkowe elementy koloru białego to the main base colour. Most often they are described by laymen as „patched” cats.
Just as we described in the Silver/Gold section – a cat's hairs may be partially coloured (at the tips of the hair). If more than half of the hair is in the base colour, then we only use the Silver/Gold colours.
Ale jeśli zabarwienia podstawowego jest mniej niż 50%, to pojawia się dodatkowe określenie koloru:
Note: Of course these additional designations (11 and 12) ALWAYS appear in combination with the Silver or Gold colour (s/y), because the remaining part of the hair (the lower part) will always be in one of these two colours.
Apart from the classic base colours or „patches” cats can also have „rysunek” na futrze w postaci pręg czy cętek.
Często koty point (especially 33 – Siamese) are described (by laymen) as „white”, because in most of them the dominant colouring is a light colour or one very close to white.
But their main and dominant colour is still the one specified in the first point (base colours). And this colour is located na łapkach, nosie, uszach i ogonie.
To jest właśnie ten kontrast between the whole body and certain specific points, which we call point.
Odmiany kolorów point:
Fun fact: Kittens are usually born very light, but with age the cat will become darker and darker in these „point” areas (in the vast majority of cases). It may also happen that in the warm months (summer) the cat has a less intense colouring, or is darker in the cold months (winter). Point to forma albinizmu, in which the warmer regions of the body are darker – hence also those possible changes over the year.
Eye colours are not always specified for Devon Rexes, because there are several situations when they have to be used, but also several when they are not used.
Kody koloru oczu muszą być użyte wtedy, gdy:
Kody koloru oczu NIE są używane gdy kot jest bicolorem (03) lub z nieokreśloną ilością bieli (09).
Kody kolorów oczu:
If a cat is „w” (white), then apart from the colours listed above (61-64) you can also use dodatkowych kolorów (ale one są używane TYLKO dla kotów białych):
Ciekawostka: Koty przez pierwsze około 10 dni życia mają całkowicie zamknięte oczy (they mainly use smell to recognise their mother and siblings). During the first weeks of life (similarly to people) their eyes are niebieskie lub niebiesko-szare (it is the result of a lack of pigment, melanin, in the irises). Then around the 5th-6th week (as a result of the accumulation of melanin) the colour becomes more intense. However, only około 5-6 miesiąca życia, nabierają właściwej barwy – niebieskiej, pomarańczowej/miedzianej czy zielonej.
As we mentioned earlier – in the above descriptions we used an excellent graphic prepared by Joumana Medlej, who agreed to the use of this graphic on our Kotki Kędziorki*PL website (all copyrights belong to her and it may not be distributed without her consent – in whole or in parts!).
Grafikę w pełnej rozdzielczości znajdziecie na jej stronie: http://cedarseed.com/portfolio/housecat-colors/, where you can also order yourself a large poster, a canvas print or even a duvet with this graphic 🙂
The graphic does not describe only Devon Rexes (so it shows many more colours, colourings and varieties), but we selected those elements that concern only our cat breed.
Now you are already almost an expert in cat colouring, especially of the Devon Rex breed 🙂 We hope we have cleared up a bit of various doubts related to colours.
W informacji o kociakach w naszych miotach oczywiście używamy tych kolorów and we also use them when you get in touch with us or when we publish something on the website or Social Media.
Również dokładnie takie kolory pojawią się w rodowodach of our kittens.
Jeśli nadal masz jakieś pytania – śmiało odezwij się do nas (strona Kontakt), postaramy się pomóc.
Note: We do not guarantee the completeness, currency or 100% certainty of these descriptions. They are the result of our knowledge, experience and many other articles on the subject (which sometimes contain discrepancies). We've tried to convey this knowledge as accurately as possible – if, however, you have any comments or doubts, write to us so we can improve this description.
We also decided to gather other places online that describe cat colours (sometimes from a slightly different perspective).
Anna Sara Gawrońska (from the Jaga*PL cattery) wrote a series of posts in a Facebook group about colours, where she focused on genetycznych podstawach kolorów. Even though it is genetics, these articles are written in very accessible language – we recommend them!
Kolory (ważna jest kolejność): Biały (w), Rudy (d), Czarny (n), Czekoladowy (b), Cynamonowy (o), Niebieski (n)
Poniżej znajdziecie zestawienie kolorów Devon Rexów, które są oficjalnie uznawane przez FIFe. During shows they are judged precisely in these individual groups.
Grupa I – Solid (również dymny/srebrny)
Grupa II – Solid z białym
Grupa III – Szylkrety
Grupa IV – Szylkrety z białym
Grupa V – Solid z wzorami
Grupa VI – Solid z białym ze wzorami
Grupa VII – Pointy + Pointy z nieokreślonym wzorem pręgowania
Grupa VIII – Points with white + Points with white with an unspecified tabby pattern
Grupa IX – Białe
