BLUE-EYED RAGDOLL (SPONTANEOUS DOMINANT BLUE EYE MUTATION)

In 2020, Helen Fitton reported an odd-eyed Ragdoll named Jean Genie. A second odd-eyed Ragdoll kitten, a blue smoke mink mitted, was born and his father was the seal smoke half brother (same mother) to the father of Jean Genie. The eyes were distinctly different shades, with one being blue because of the colourpoint gene, but the other being blue due to the white spotting gene. Helen initially wondered if there was any link to the silver (inhibitor) gene because of the blue-eyed silver series cats that had been reported elsewhere.

The mother of Jean Genie (aka Eva), the first odd-eyed kitten, was a blue smoke mink bicolour and the father was chocolate smoke colourpoint mitted. The father of the more recent kitten was high grade seal smoke mink mitted, and the mother was blue smoke colourpoint mitted.

Most people's first comment is that Niamey, a seal mink Ragdoll has blue eyes and not aqua eyes. While aqua (midway between a colourpoint's blue-eyes and a sepia's golden-eyes) is the preferred colour in mink pattern cats, it's not the only colour possible. Eye colour in cats isn't as simple as mixing paint. Mink pattern cats have a range of eyes colours from blue through to yellow, but breeders prefer aqua.

At first, the odd eyes and intense blue eyes turned up in mink Ragdolls that were smoke or had a smoke parent. By October 2021, there were more odd eyed cats and some beautiful intensely blue eyed mink bicolour boys. An odd-eyed blue sepia bicolour sired a litter of sepia kittens; a blue sepia (without white) had blue eyes but the rest of the litter had aqua eyes. A blue mink in the litter had a very short tail and white toes on one back foot.

In the 18 months up to October 2021, a further 7 odd eyed Ragdolls had been born. Not all had a smoke parent, but all traced to Niamey, the blue-eyed seal mink Ragdoll. Vet Sarah May believed that Helen's mink Ragdolls had a spontaneous mutation for Dominant Blue Eyes (DBE). The family tree shows the descendants of Niamey, Helen's foundation mink female with colour coding showing the cats with odd eyes or intense blue eyes (DBE).

Dominant blue eyes have turned up in other breeder's Ragdolls though I don't have details for linechasing back for common ancestors. Some breeders have been accused of having experimental lines or crossing their Ragdolls to Altai or to experimental blue-eyed British Shorthair/British Longhair cats, or of deliberately breeding odd-eyed and blue-eyed mink cats so they could charge more for the kittens.

It seems likely that some forms of dominant blue eyes (actually an incomplete dominant) have been hiding in plain sight, probably in bicolour and solid white cats which naturally have blue eyes. It then gets noticed when intense blue or odd eyes appear in cats with little or no white. It is also possible that the gene involved is prone to mutation for some reason.