"1. A human eye is not a cat eye, and personal experiences with alleged human albinos are of no interest in this regard." It was you who posted the link to the Wiki article mainly about human albinoism... "2. Blue eyes in mammals" Right, so you are allowed to talk about other mammals but I'm not? "are a result of a lack (or at least reduction of) eumelanin in the iris." I've already given a reference for blue eyes in cats being due to a reduction in melanin as in albinos. "However, in a "true", complete albino," Oh right, so now we want to ignore the fact that the first article you refered me to speaks about their being different grades of albinoism? With some of them including a degree of pigment? That is just so inconvenient... "red eyes are typical, wheras in the various forms of leucism, both blue (more often) and red eyes can be observed." And the second article you refered me to quite clearly states that leucism does not change eye colour, and that is one of the things that distinguishes it from albinoism. I guess if someone turns up a picture of that fishing cat that clearly shows it having red eyes you are still going to argue for it being leucistic? "temperature sensitive albinos" is a rather imprecise term." Feel free to give us a more precise term for what happens with pointed domestic cats, since it certainly looks to me like that fishing cat MIGHT be showing pale pointing. "3. The residual marking rather indicates that said Fishing cat is rather a leucistic or very high grade hypomelanistic specimen." So are you agreeing with me now? Quote from your first Wike article: "There are two different forms of albinism; a partial lack of the melanin is known as hypomelanism, or hypomelanosis and the total absence of melanin is known as amelanism or amelanosis." So the cat could be leucistic or albino. Well done! That's really moved the debate along! "More pics could be useful." We can agree on that. Though if you can find some references for both blue and red eyes being caused by leucanism then I think that would bring the allocations on half this thread into doubt!
Someone just emailed me a pdf article with accompanying photo of the only record of a white ocelot!!! As a cat lover, this is huge news for me. Unfortunately, the hotlink attached to the article leads to a site that requires a membership or payment to access the article, so I cannot provide a link to the photo. It was in the gran chaco of Paraguay and was seen on at least three occasions between 2004-2006. The photo shows it treed by hounds and is a very clear closeup in full daylight (albeit in black & white). BTW, to add fuel to the fire of the previous debate, the article uses the term leucistic. Of course the gran chaco is a hot thorn desert where pale pelage might be an advantage. This further intrigues me because I have read anectodal accounts (but never a primary source) of occasional sightings of white jaguars in the gran chaco. If it could happen with ocelot here then I think it could definitely happen with jaguar.
dwarf badgers Not really a mutation but is there any more news about those 'miniature' badgers living on the island off the West coast of Ireland?
Interesting. Its sort of 'off white' as the lower leg markings are still distinct and purer white by contrast with the body.
another photo of the Satpura gaur (plural): White Gaur- Satpura From Valmik Thapar's "Land Of The Tiger" (1997): "In Satpura there are four totally white gaur — presumably albinos or some genetic sport — who, amid their black companions, appear like ghosts in a forest!" and then also: [ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manjampatti_white_bison]Manjampatti white bison - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]
I know it's been two months since this topic has been posted in, but I just came across this while doing a quick internet search: They call them Burchell golden oryx, and there's a whole website about them: Home - Burchell Golden Oryx Edit: While we're on the topic of antelope color morphs: Golden gnu [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tum41pPNUKM/Tv4VU1MX-JI/AAAAAAAAPW4/3HWUj-k5wuQ/s1600/SG201989.JPG Black springbok (Posted as a link as the picture was too big to post directly) White springbok There are also copper springbok, but I couldn't find a picture of one that wasn't a trophy being posed with....
just as an aside, I found it quite amusing that the author captioning the photos on the above link was making reference to the colour of the glass (!) eyes (for the photos of the leopard and lynx)
No, but here is a pale (erythristic) leopard currently in South Africa. "Strawberry" Leopard Discovered?A First A few years ago a zoo in my state (Wildlife World Zoo) claimed that they had two white leopard cubs born to a normal colored mother and a black father. I went up to see them when they were several months old, but by that time they were both normal colored (even though the zoo was still calling one of them white). I never saw photos of them when they were younger, but I assume they started out lighter than usual for the first couple months of life but quickly grew out of it.
How about these two pretty bizarre animals: An all-white Eastern quoll (stuffed in the Australian Museum) All White Albino Eastern Quoll - Where Light Meets Dark (www.wherelightmeetsdark.com) Or near the bottom of the page, an albino Southern tamandua • View topic - Albino Tamandua
Here is a white orca currently in the waters off Russia World News - All-white killer whale spotted off Russia's east coast
Interesting taht they mention that another female white Orca was captured by an aquarium. I did a quick google search and came across this. http://www.orcahome.de/chimo.htm apparently her name was Chimo and she was on display for two years at the Victoria, B.C., aquarium!
I was just looking around for information about Neotropical opossums on the internet, and I managed to find this pretty rare footage of an albino thick-tailed or lutrine opossum. And, just for comparison, the original page showing normal examples of this species. Thick-tailed Opossum – Lutreolina crassicaudata - Reserva Ecológica Costanera Sur
that albino possum looks weirdly like a ferret or ermine when it's all white like that. Imagine coming across that in the wild, you wouldn't have a clue what it might have been!
a white slow loris: primates.com : prosimians : lorises : an albino slow loris and white pigmy marmoset twins born in Sweden: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/09/060901-monkeys-photo.html
