# Temperament - genetic or environmental?



## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

As this has been touched by two separate threads recently and it is a fascinating subject, it probably needs a new thread.

Is the Asian leopard cat input in Bengals responsible for the allegations of aggressive territorial behaviour in some of these cats or is that just a coincidence and they would have turned out "bad" anyway?

Is temperament in any cat decided by a cat's genes and its breeding or does it solely depend on how it is brought up, and socialised by the breeder and pet owner?

Is bad temperament a trait that is just inherited from its feisty mother or unhandleable father? 
Can it occur in the offspring of perfect parents?
Is it OK to breed from poor temperament parents as the offspring can then all be sorted out by good handling?

I am asking about all breeds and moggies here, not just Bengals.


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## tellingtails (Jul 28, 2010)

I am very much an advocate of its the way they are raised, anyone who follows the exploits of Craig the lion man ,knows even wild animals can be tamed.

Its more a question of understanding your breed,and how to raise,socialise,etc

Welcome to the official Lionman Website : Craig Busch and the Big Cat Sanctuary at Zion Wildlife Gardens

As I have said in a previous thread all cats have a genetic link one way or another to a wildcat ancestary.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

I would think that the selection of traits by people long ago are responsible for the domesticity that we see in animals today.
Animals were selected for malleability and how they fitted into the daily lives, dangerous, unpredictable ones would have been removed by being eaten or turned back to the wild. It would have been no good spending all day chasing cows in order to get close enough to milk them, or being eaten by dangerous dogs.
Those with good handleable traits would multiply and end up domesticated in the main.

Temperament is inherited just the same as coat, or body shape or ear length. Temperament can be altered by the treatment the animal receives, but I still believe it is the individuals make up that still dictates that to some extent. Hence you get children suffering child abuse who go on to live entirely normal lives and others suffering the same abuse who end up as mental cripples.

The Scottish wild cat, is untameable, so if it is all about environment how is it that no-one has ever tamed one?


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## messyhearts (Feb 6, 2009)

It can't all be about nuture. Many breeders will attest to raising a litter of four to eight kittens with many different personalities even though they got the same handling, same interactions and essentially same up bringing so it must be genetic.


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## Aurelia (Apr 29, 2010)

My thought on this ...

It's first of all a shame we can't go back 10,000 and see how the first domestic cats behaved. I think that could answer the question better than anything else.

I do believe that if you take a cat into your home, no matter their temperament ... if she was then to have kittens, you could in theory raise them to be cats of good, docile temperament if you put the time and effort into doing so. However if you then take the cat into another environment they will revert back to their genetic traits. But then, once again return to their docile temperament when back in the familiar environment they were raised in.

It takes many years for a species to evolve, or begin to evolve beyond a point where these things can change, including genes and traits. But I don't think any species can change so much that their original traits disappear. Else our domestic cats would not hunt, or fight over territory and mating rights.

After almost 10,000 years ... they still have some of the original traits of wild cats! For a new species/breed this would almost definitely be a worry for me. There is no way you can breed out some of the 'survival' traits in such a new breed IMO.

Glad you started this Lauren, it is really starting to interest me too ... the more and more I read


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

IMHO Its a bit of nature and a bit of nurture 

and the split between the two is never divided the exact same way  it could be 50/50, it could be 70/30 it could be 30/70. 

the way I rear kittens remains constant, they way they turn out doesnt  so that would point to nature takes the bigger role, not nurture. 

But I have had experiences of turning a x-th generation feral kitten into a lovely friendly sociable pet. So that points to nurture. 

But I dont generally get life-long updates on my foster kittens, so I have no idea how they are when they mature. I do know one of my success story feral kittens badly attacked a child with no provocation and it wasnt just an exaggerated story the new owners palmed me off with so they get defend rehoming their kitten, I saw the child and the hospital report! I advised against rehoming and took it myself to get put down. 

And these are just feral domestics, hand reared in my home I really would worry if they had other species wild blood in them. 

people talk about feral cats and I have raised feral young, some with mothers some without (even those with mothers we tend to separate them very young)  but that word feral covers such a wide spectrum of behavior that its practically useless. Is a feral cat a cat who was once a pet but has lived for a year on the streets now after being turfed out by its owners, or is it 10th generation totally isolated from civilization feral or is it somewhere in between those two extremes. And even with xth generation ferals say for instance when we lived in Dubai, feral colonies populate the many building sites there, and some of those very (true) feral kittens grow up taking sandwiches and saucers of water from the labourers, or coming to a volunteer run feral feeding station every day, so they aint that feral. 

Lauren, while I strongly agree with you it is not all about environment, the Scottish wild cat analogy. I am not sure that is such a great one there is only about an estimated 50 to 100 of them left (right?) and do we know if anyone has ever tried trapping and taming one? And if a kitten less than 4 weeks old has been trapped and taming has been attempted? I would only rule out they couldnt be tamed, if a pregnant queen was trapped and the kittens were exposed to humans from day one, and removed as soon as poss from the mother. Would I want a tamed Scottish WC for a pet. Absolutely not! Apart from the fact I think it is unethical to take wild animals from the wild just for our enjoyment. I wouldnt trust them as far as I could throw them. There is such a wealth of anecdotal evidence against Bengal and their tendency for aggression A tamed SWC makes me very worried. 

So for me it will always remain part genes part environment (part nature part nurture).

Anybody interested in this nature v nurture topic as it pertains to humans I can recommend a couple of excellent books, although I think with humans environment/nurture plays a far bigger role than in cats where genetics/nature plays a bigger role.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

Kittens are going to have differing personalities because every one of them will have been raised slightly differently. As newborns strength and the survival instinct have them fighting for position and from that moment on there are differences. It's far more complicated than straight genetics versus a simplistic view of how kittens are socialised. Kittens of 3 weeks old will hiss at strangers - and mean it. At this age it must still be pure survival instinct, the fight or flight response coming to the fore if you like.

I don't know at what point this could become 'hard wired'. Conventional thinking talks of 6 weeks being a critical age for socialisation but I believe it could crucially be a longer period from about 3-7 weeks. It's a gradual process, a gaining of confidence and I do honestly think it's a learned behaviour in great measure.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

> After almost 10,000 years ... they still have some of the original traits of wild cats! For a new species/breed this would almost definitely be a worry for me. There is no way you can breed out some of the 'survival' traits in such a new breed IMO


I tend to agree, to take a completely wild cat and in a relatively few generations expect the cat to be totally domesticated is a big ask.
I realise that the addition of domestic genes in the form of Bengals (which also carry "wild genes") at each generation away from the wild, may dilute the wild factor, but by how much it is difficult to tell. 
Perhaps in this "uncontrolled" situation of suburban gardens and faced with "threats" some do revert more to their wild instincts, more so that if they had ended up in an indoor home which is a much more controlled, less scary place.


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## Aurelia (Apr 29, 2010)

With regards to Bengals and the ALC part of them ... I've been trying to find some footage of ALC's in the wild behaving 'wild' (so hunting, fighting, protecting young ...). If someone could lay their hands on some such footage, I wonder if Bengal owners would recognise this behaviour in their more aggressive pets that do go outdoors.

It would be interesting to see.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> After almost 10,000 years ... they still have some of the original traits of wild cats! For a new species/breed this would almost definitely be a worry for me. There is no way you can breed out some of the 'survival' traits in such a new breed IMO


How can you 'breed it out'. I honestly don't believe we have. Have you ever watched newborn kittens? They are ferocious wild animals, it's nature red in tooth and claw.


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## Aurelia (Apr 29, 2010)

havoc said:


> How can you 'breed it out'. I honestly don't believe we have. Have you ever watched newborn kittens? They are ferocious wild animals, it's nature red in tooth and claw.


I don't believe you can, which is what I'm saying


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

I think many people have tried to tame Scottish wild cats, with no success. I think that even in zoos and wildlife parks it would be better to be able to handle them if it was possible to do so to guarantee their survival in captive breeding programs, by all accounts attempts fail.

The ALC is a different animal and although many do continue to exhibit wild traits especially when fully grown, many are tameable.

I think the ALC in the wild is extremely elusive and as you are finding it is easier to find a video of an ALC in a cage, in the bath or on the sofa than one in the wild.
I did find
YouTube - Leopard Cat - Prionailurus bengalensis - ConCaSa - mostly just walking about though.

YouTube - Leopard Cat (Prionailurus bengalensis) - hissing in captivity
YouTube - Wild Leopard Cat in the Hospital - ditto

YouTube - Leopard cat captured by WWF Malaysia camera - sitting and blinking.


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## Aurelia (Apr 29, 2010)

Yeah I found several similar clips Lauren, including this disturbing one of an F1 in it's new home  YouTube - Asian Leopard (3/4 F1 Bengal) - Martin at his new home   poor thing.

It would be great if the BBC research team did a whole hour long episode on the ALC and got that gorgeous curly haired camera guy to film it too


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

Martin looks a bit better here, but still only 3 and 1/2 months old and posted a year ago, nothing more recent to see how his temperament is now.

YouTube - svitlanamoore5's Channel


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

I think we need a proper definition of 'temperament' to know what we're discussing. All my cats (and kittens) have very distinct and different personalities but they all have great temperament. This is why I come down very firmly on the side of nurture. Personality traits are certainly inherited but how they manifest themselves is very much to do with how the kitten is raised. A naturally cautious kitten could become an aggressive cat or a very loving one depending on how it's handled and socialised when very young. It wasn't born 'bad'. When we talk of temperament we mean an overall idea of how that cat interacts with humans or other animals, takes on changes, copes with the world. Just as with our children it's up to us breeders to ensure we bring out the very best of their individual personalities from the start because what we do makes a huge difference.


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

I think breeders are going to have a whole different take on this than fosterers as we're dealing with different "raw materials"... ok we both have litters of kittens, but the differences in the parents of those kittens are massive. 

even amongst fosterers, there will be differences too based on the kittens theyre dealing with (or rather the parents of those kittens and what their background is)

If we had some kind of scale where we gave marks for kittens personality/temperament/disposition and marked them out of 20, 1 being the lowest - then my BSH breeder friends kittens would all fall into the 14-20 range. They are all bred from good mothers and good fathers, selected especially for their suitability as parents. 

my kittens would fall into the 1-20 range. I simply do see a FAR wider range of behavior with my kittens, both the hand reared kittens and the ones with mothers. 

I know the care I provide is not 100% consistent, none of us act EXACTLY the same with every litter, but for the sake of normal discussion, my care is as near as consistent as it gets, purely because I am a pretty anal type and live with routine and consistency playing a big part of my life. 

But even with my foster cats, say here in Holland or in the UK, the vast majority of kittens we see in rescue come from a mother cat who was a pet (who got dumped or wandered of). These mothers might not be the best examples of pets, but they are (or were) pets. The fathers too are invariably unneutered pet tom cats. 

In the 3rd world (developing countries) places I have lived, the kittens I had invariably came from street cats (ranging from the true ferals with zero contact with humans to the street cats who grow up scavenging at market places and hawker stalls, so quite familiar with people, they just dont live with people). 

Back to points out of 20 scale for behvaiour/temperament/disposition my UK/Holland litters, where the mothers and fathers are generally pets to one degree or another  those kittens would (say) all fall in the 7 to 20 points out of 20 by the time they are 12 weeks old.

My Thailand/Malaysia/Dubai litters would cover the whole of the 1 to 20 spectrum. 

Wherever I live I separate kittens from mothers at around 3-4 weeks (sometimes earlier) if the mother is very feral (scared of people, aggressive) so the kittens dont develop those traits through seeing them. 

I am 100% sure if my breeder friend deposited one of her pregnant queens at my house I would achieve the same 14-20 points as her with the kittens (when I am working with good materials I can get good results). And I think if I popped over to a market in Thailand and brought a pregnant soi cat (street cat) over to her to rear, she would get the same 1-20 results I get.

This points to nature playing a big role (bigger than nurture). 

The good news is though. some kittens (even the ones from feral and semi-feral parents) I rear do get into the high points, and that must be nurture, and without that nurture, instead of end exam points of 16 out of 20 they would maybe have achieved 6 out of 20 if they had grown up under a stall on a market place. So that points to nurture playing a very important role. 

And thats why I have to conclude that its both nature and nurture. 

With humans though it might not be all nurture, but nurture plays a far bigger role (main) role. With humans I am firmly in the nurture camp, with cats I am its a bit of both.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

I don't think we're necessarily singing from different song sheets here. Yes you would get that same 14-20 range from a litter born to a queen who herself was relaxed and confident. It's how much of the whole thing down generations has been passed on genetically or is learned behaviour which I question. I do make a definite split between a kitten's individual personality traits and how those are then managed and manipulated at an early stage to end up with the overall thing we call temperament. I'm not saying personality traits aren't inherited, they definitely are.

I've come round more to the nurture side over the years because I've seen other people's kittens sired by my boys. I have the benefit if you like of a full picture. Make no mistake, I can look at a 6 week old kitten, the way it plays and think 'oh boy are you ever your father's son'. The traits are there but how the kitten's personality develops overall is slightly different in different households. Not better or worse necessarily, different.

I guess what it boils down to is that I firmly believe the environment makes a huge difference and the making of that difference probably starts earlier than we used to think. There are points at which certain things are 'set' and after that cannot be recovered fully. I'm not saying I know when those points are, it's the very question that interests me.

I believe it's not all in the breeding because I have cats of the same lines as other breeders who do things differently Owners who have had kittens from different breeders can see the difference the day they take their kitten home. I've had the experience recently, one owner had a kitten from me when they already had one from a particular breeder and another had a kitten from me and subsequently got one from the other breeder. This therefore can have nothing to do with being the incumbent kitten or the newcomer. Both owners have commented on the difference, how you can tell which one came from me. That can't simply be down to the genes - or maybe I'd just like to think it isn't


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

havoc said:


> I've come round more to the nurture side over the years because I've seen other people's kittens sired by my boys. I have the benefit if you like of a full picture. Make no mistake, I can look at a 6 week old kitten, the way it plays and think 'oh boy are you ever your father's son'. The traits are there but how the kitten's personality develops overall is slightly different in different households. Not better or worse necessarily, different.


That is something of course I'll never experience. But it is in an excellent point! And it points to nurture.

I think over the years I have come round more to the nature side, purely because my fairly consistent care (nurture) ends up with fairly inconsistent results…. But of course I do think nurture plays a big role too, otherwise I'd just feed and water them.

I have no idea when things are "set". On one hand I say very early, and that's why I remove kittens early, sometimes far earlier than feral rescue circles recommend, from "bad" or feral mothers. But I once had two kittens come to me at 6/7 weeks old, veryyyy undernourished, on the verge of death (and they'd been kept very isolated with their very shy/scared mother and one other sibling till that point). I spent so much time and energy getting their weight up, I had no time or real chances to socialize them, unless sticking a syringe in their mouths is socialization (which I suppose actually it is). Anyway at 12 weeks (1200g) a nice family came to look at them, I was honest with them that they were not good examples of kittens and had zero idea if they could ever catch up on their social development, I doubted they would, they would at best become very timid shy scared adult cats. They went to live with the family (who got every book out of the library that they could find, printed reams of stuff off the net, even the kids who were about 9 and 12 were determined they could make these kittens normal cats) and I am so pleased to report they succeeded! Within 6 months in their new home they were normal friendly confident cuddly moggy cats.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

I don't think everything is 'set' at the same time. I do wish I could explain myself better but this is a very complicated subject. As you may have gathered I've done a fair bit of kitten watching over the years. There's loads more to the nurture side than how we socialise those kittens. Would one kitten turn out differently if it were born into a different litter of the same mating but a different set of siblings? Does the male/female ratio make a difference?

One of the simplest things to explain that I have noticed is the hunting/killing thing. All cats are genetically programmed to hunt but different mothers teach slightly differently. Watched closely, different litters learn very slightly different methods from their mother and then from each other. My current litter will probably never be cats which would jump to take a flying object. They, like their mother are ground stalkers. I know this sounds mad but the mother was never a 'jumper' in play and her instructive tail twitching always stayed at ground level. At an age when other litters would jump for a toy these don't. They're perfectly capable of jumping on my bed by the way, it isn't that they can't or won't jump they just don't 'hunt' that way.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

That's so interesting, havoc. Who would have thought? 

One thing I have read before (but now I can't remember the source ) is that, while the hunt itself is largely instinctual, kittens learn the actual 'killing bite' from mom. So if mom is a housecat, or the kittens are taken away too young, they never learn that final bite.

I do suppose that they must eventually be able to work it out themselves, if they have enough motivation of being hungry, though?

Has anyone else had any experience either with this, or the other way around? Any 6 week old kittens that go on to decimate the countryside? 

Our cats (always older kittens, but always from indoor mothers) have never been real hunters, and they have always looked so confused about what to do whenever they have actually caught something that, most of the time, the prey was unhurt and could be released relatively unscathed.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> Any 6 week old kittens that go on to decimate the countryside?


I'd imagine so as they start the learning process from the moment they have their eyes open. They are learning and 'setting' some behaviours far earlier than people think. As far as this thread is concerned and so we don't go completely off topic, I see 'temperament' as thousands of individual traits all of which can develop differently to make up the whole. If they are learning the hunting thing through play from two weeks old what other things are already becomming learned behaviour?


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

Atlantys said:


> One thing I have read before (but now I can't remember the source ) is that, while the hunt itself is largely instinctual, kittens learn the actual 'killing bite' from mom. So if mom is a housecat, or the kittens are taken away too young, they never learn that final bite.
> 
> I do suppose that they must eventually be able to work it out themselves, if they have enough motivation of being hungry, though?
> 
> Has anyone else had any experience either with this, or the other way around? Any 6 week old kittens that go on to decimate the countryside?


I don't know if this counts... we once had a litter of motherless street kittens from about eyes-just-opening age.... I have no idea what became of the rest of the litter, but two went to a colleague of my husband's... and were indoor only cats and these kittens would continually kill those little gecko/lizard things that come through the air-conditioning vents. Hope this isn't TMI but there was evidence of the lizards been thoroughly played with before the kill. And I promise, I taught them to wee and poo in the litter tray but I never taught them to kill lizards... certainly not that way! (sucking them up with the vacuum cleaner, maybe... but not mauling them to death!)

I've also had a cat of my own (indoor only, from an indoor only mum and dad) who was ace at catching bats from the balcony of our then 4th floor apartment.

That debate last week about bengal behaviour, and their love of water... is that genetic (because of the ALC ancestry) or is it nurture because that one foundation queen way back then just taught it to her 1st litter of hybrids, and the females have passed it on down the line to todays generations? I got way layed for hours on the net reading up on that. I am none the wiser though.


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

havoc said:


> There's loads more to the nurture side than how we socialise those kittens. Would one kitten turn out differently if it were born into a different litter of the same mating but a different set of siblings? Does the male/female ratio make a difference?


have you read the book "they fcuk you up, parents do" by Oliver James? He goes into exactly this topic in great detail, but obviously pertaining to humans, not cats. And what he has to say is very very interesting!!


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> I taught them to wee and poo in the litter tray but I never taught them to kill lizards... certainly not that way!


And that's the bit that fascinates me. ALL cats hunt, it's the tiny differences in how that I look at with kittens and their mothers. The things I notice must be huge compared with much of what goes on that my stupid human brain doesn't register as significant.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

Thanks, Tje and Havoc.

To be honest, I thought it was probably utter nonsense when I read it, as it makes absolutely no sense for that predatory behaviour to be learned when it's so key to survival. It must be ingrained, and our 'housecats' are not as far from their wild cousins as some of us like to think (the fluffy, furry, purry thing currently turning himself inside-out to block my view of my laptop is a complete exception to this, of course  :lol.

The fact that our pedigreed cats were more likely to maul something to death if we didn't get there in time, rather than being able to kill it quickly, and that the tiny (4 weeks-ish) but feral kitten we rescued from a storm drain did turn into a killing machine (with the same access to food in bowls as the pedigrees) did make me think, though.

I think we might have blunted their instincts slightly by domesticating cats, but I do believe that nature plays as strong a role as nurture in determining how they ultimately turn out.

ETA: And by that, I don't mean that Pepsi stayed feral. She was never particularly shy, loved attention and affection (on her terms), and became a typical moggy, even though mom had been quite wild, so nurture did play a strong role in Peps' development. I just think that 'friendliness' is maybe not the deciding factor we should be looking at in the 'nature vs. nurture' debate on temperament, and that we should maybe be looking at more fundamental traits to determine domesticity.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

Tje said:


> have you read the book "they fcuk you up, parents do" by Oliver James? He goes into exactly this topic in great detail, but obviously pertaining to humans, not cats. And what he has to say is very very interesting!!


Sounds fascinating. I'll look into it.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> as it makes absolutely no sense for that predatory behaviour to be learned when it's so key to survival


Well there is the other side to this in that some behaviour is unlearned in what we'd call a well socialised kitten. Kittens bite. I've never ever known a 3/4 week old kitten that doesn't bite in playing with their siblings or human fingers. This is an obvious example of a behaviour which we humans modify in what we call socialisation. We probably interrupt a developmental process when we gently suggest they learn not to bite us.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

Oh, absolutely. It's impossible to deny that nurture is hugely important too, but I would hate to try to determine if one is more critical than the other. I don't believe you can. 

I think there's probably a reason why the debate is a debate, and why it's been ongoing for so long. 

It is a fascinating topic, though.


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## Tje (Jan 16, 2010)

Atlantys, if you ever read the James Oliver book get back to me on what you think of his take on things like schizophrenia  he puts forward some VERY good arguments for common mental disorders being nurture and not nature. Blew me away reading it. Most of it is just disputing the common myths like well it must be genetics/nature/the shy gene because mum and dad are very outgoing and so I am and my oldest brother, its only the middle sister thats shy and he counters with that is down to the gender and the placing within the family. That the same sister in the middle wouldve been very different if she had been a boy, or very different if she had been born the eldest or the youngest instead of the middle. So *very* much like Havocs ponderings on kittens.

Like I said earlier, with humans I am very much on the side of nurture playing the biggest role

Kittens both nature and nurture play massive roles.

Oh and another book, just a novel, but it created TONS of debate on the nature/nurture argument (many book clubs and online book review sites said theyd never had a book create so much heated and passionate debate) was We need to talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver. Again, nature v nurture. Its about a young highschool kid in the US who shoots the whole school down. Did his parents make him that way, or was he born bad. Great book but so not feline I had better shut up before I get my wrist smacked for going off topic.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

Okay, will do. 

And while we're exchanging non-feline book links, you _have _to read Sarah Blaffer Hrdy's _Mother Nature: Maternal Instricts & The Shaping of the Species_ (not an order of course,  but it is a book on the topic I enjoyed very much).

She's an anthropologist, primatologist and evolutionary biologist and she weighs up nature and nurture as it applies to both women (modern and those in isolated cultures) and primates, talking about maternal instincts, infanticide and maternal love, why human babies would have evolved to be so helpless for so long, paternal commitment and why babies are the way they are.

Really, it's one of the most fascinating books I've ever read.


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## billyboysmammy (Sep 12, 2009)

wow what an interesting debate.


My view is firmly that it is certainly a bit of both.

Ive spent alot of time watching kittens and tend to agree with havoc that there are so many variables that the line between nature and nurture could never been found, i dont think its that distinct.

Using dogs as an example, I tend to believe that breed traits are nature over nuture. I know its "man made" traits, and that there are always exceptions to any rule, but thats what my insticts tell me. Huskys are independant, untrustworthy offlead and destructive in the garden, Terriers are tenacious and stubborn, springers are biddable and a little bit bonkers.... you get the idea.

My current litter of foster kittens (who are ready for new homes!!!), were all partially handreared. They have been handled, cuddled and well socialised with children, dogs other cats and other people. However mum is very aloof, and so is one of her sons. He is very much a "i'll come to you when i want attention and not before" sort of fella. His siblings are both much more loving, and scrambling for attention whenever its available (and most of the time when its not!). They all play together, all snuggle with the other cats and the dogs, but one is just that little bit more of a loner. He isnt nasty, he isnt vicious, and he isnt timid, he is just aloof.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

I think that cats were chosen to live in houses all over the world to hunt and kill small furries, usually rats and mice.

The ones selected over the generations as being good mousers were kept and the others that survived were also the ones capable of catching their own dinner, hence the cats we have inherited are the decendants of those.

Had the domestic pet cat been an esteemed pet being paraded around on a cushions and continues to be that today, then the hunting instinct may not be so highly developed and in fact it may have been almost lost all together if any sign of a hunting, chasing, killing behaviour had been frowned upon.

Today I feel we have a mix in that some have very keen hunting instincts whilst others just see prey as toys and have no real killer instinct, both are capable of multiplying nowadays as the hunting instinct is no longer necessary for survival in the majority of pet cats. 

I think that some of these traits are inherited and I also feel that the basic personality/temperament is inherited but can be moulded by what the cat experiences and learns as it grows and develops. So an outgoing cat can lose its confidence if it is bullied or abused and a shy cat can be "normal" if given an environment where it feels safe and secure.

I also hear stories about ferals being tamed and turning into "normal" cats, could it be that intrinsically they were just "normal" cats in the first place and that try exactly the same taming regime with others and they would have remained "wild", as "wild" is what intrinsically they were. 
I would guess that they came from a long line of cats with "wild" behaviour, whereas a few generations ago the "normal" ones' ancestors were on someone's sofa.

Inheritance is a complicated business, and the inheritance of temperament is unlikely to be a simple inheritance, so saying that the progeny from a "wild" dad have normal temperaments proves nothing as the "wild" element may not surface again for a few generations down the line, but it still comes from the original "wild" dad. If you mate the "wild" dad to the right cat with the right combination of genes, a % of the progeny could be "wild" too.

The fur farm fox experiment was interesting as it showed that selecting good temperament over bad, produced fewer and fewer foxes with poor temperaments as you went down the generations. I am sure they could have done the same by selecting for "wild" ones.


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## Atlantys (Aug 24, 2010)

lauren001 said:


> The fur farm fox experiment was interesting as it showed that selecting good temperament over bad, produced fewer and fewer foxes with poor temperaments as you went down the generations. I am sure they could have done the same by selecting for "wild" ones.


True. But to me the most fascinating thing about the experiment is that it proved that the genes for domestication are connected to those for coat colour. The foxes in the experiment turned out to be useless for fur, as, although they were friendly and easy to manage, their fur started to exhibit the same range of colours and patterns that other domestic species (cats, dogs, cows, horses etc.) do.

It was something I wanted to bring up earlier in the debate on Bengals, but I haven't yet had the time to find feline-specific sources yet. But if Bengal breeders are specifically breeding for wild-type coat patterns, they could very well be selecting for wild temperaments in their kittens without realising it.


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## billyboysmammy (Sep 12, 2009)

Atlantys said:


> True. But to me the most fascinating thing about the experiment is that it proved that the genes for domestication are connected to those for coat colour. The foxes in the experiment turned out to be useless for fur, as, although they were friendly and easy to manage, their fur started to exhibit the same range of colours and patterns that other domestic species (cats, dogs, cows, horses etc.) do.
> 
> It was something I wanted to bring up earlier in the debate on Bengals, but I haven't yet had the time to find feline-specific sources yet. But if Bengal breeders are specifically breeding for wild-type coat patterns, they could very well be selecting for wild temperaments in their kittens without realising it.


thats a very good point!


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

Atlantys said:


> It was something I wanted to bring up earlier in the debate on Bengals, but I haven't yet had the time to find feline-specific sources yet. But if Bengal breeders are specifically breeding for wild-type coat patterns, they could very well be selecting for wild temperaments in their kittens without realising it.


I think the fox farm experiment with its resulting range of colours was interesting but I presume some of those colour genes were being carried by the foxes anyway and that in the normal scheme of things those colours and patterns were not selected for breeding.
By changing the focus to temperament it then became immaterial that the fox had a white blaze or four white paws and so it was possible for it to breed and spread that look to others.

I also wonder it there was some biased selection from the researchers perhaps even subconsciously and presented with two animals with identical temperaments and assessments, perhaps the one that looked more dog-like or cuter or more unusual was saved and thus bred onwards. I would think that presented with choices we all make decisions based our own experiences, whether we are conscious of them or not.

As to Bengals I feel you could have a point however there is also the point that in a breed where colour and pattern is very, very important, things like temperament can be overlooked and played down, if the specimen has the wow factor or has a trait that others would desire.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> Huskys are independant, untrustworthy offlead and destructive in the garden, Terriers are tenacious and stubborn, springers are biddable and a little bit bonkers.... you get the idea.


Absoloutely I do and I kept wanting to quote dogs as they're much more distinct in breed traits. Many, many years ago I moved to Scotland and was quite surprised at the reaction to my two Golden Retrievers. People were terrified at the sight of them. Turned out I'd moved to an area where this breed were being bred commercially in a puppy farm and there were quite a few really nasty minded examples around. Puppy farmers will change breed to suit demand and it doesn't seem reasonable to me that you can undo tens (or hundreds) of years of good temperament in a couple of generations if genetics were the only factor. I'm very fond of pointing out that cats aren't dogs so I don't think direct comparisons can be made but it is probably the very thing that started my intense interest in kitten development.

One thing I'd love to try though wouldn't do is to have a litter from a rescue mog. There is no doubt that even adult cats learn from each other and my rescues are definitely 'lifted' by my pedigree foreign breed family. They learn to do things they would never dream up on their own and inevitably become far more vocal. It would be fascinating to see if this learned behaviour was then passed onto their kittens.


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## billyboysmammy (Sep 12, 2009)

havoc said:


> Absoloutely I do and I kept wanting to quote dogs as they're much more distinct in breed traits. Many, many years ago I moved to Scotland and was quite surprised at the reaction to my two Golden Retrievers. People were terrified at the sight of them. Turned out I'd moved to an area where this breed were being bred commercially in a puppy farm and there were quite a few really nasty minded examples around. Puppy farmers will change breed to suit demand and it doesn't seem reasonable to me that you can undo tens (or hundreds) of years of good temperament in a couple of generations if genetics were the only factor. I'm very fond of pointing out that cats aren't dogs so I don't think direct comparisons can be made but it is probably the very thing that started my intense interest in kitten development.
> 
> One thing I'd love to try though wouldn't do is to have a litter from a rescue mog. There is no doubt that even adult cats learn from each other and my rescues are definitely 'lifted' by my pedigree foreign breed family. They learn to do things they would never dream up on their own and inevitably become far more vocal. It would be fascinating to see if this learned behaviour was then passed onto their kittens.


absoloutly some of it is learned behaviour.

Having an eclectic mix of mogs and peds here, the kittens pick up certain behaviours from others.

The smallest of my current fosters was besotted with my cornish rex. Due to their siamese ancestry she is VERY vocal (not so much a meow as a yowel), and the kitten makes the same noises and demands in the same way. She also started to catch daddy long legs just like sheba, whereas mum is a stalker not a pouncer. She was an absoloute darling too and went to her new home last weekend  - thankfully i get to see her every day almost as she lives about 200yards away with a school friend of my daughter.

The middle kitten (scruffy - the black smoke) is best mates with my coonie celeste. They play roughly together and spend the rest of the time layed out like they have been shot in exactly the same pose. Celeste has also taught her how to lie in wait for billy dog to enter the room so they can pounce together in a tag team!

this is just one example from my current litter that kittens not only learn behaviour from their mother, but from the other cats and animals in the house.

Still i am very much of the opinon that cats do inherit behavioural traits from their parents. I think the essense of their personality is inherited, the execution of that behaviour is often taught.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

havoc said:


> Puppy farmers will change breed to suit demand and it doesn't seem reasonable to me that you can undo tens (or hundreds) of years of good temperament in a couple of generations if genetics were the only factor.


I think that in the case of puppy farmers turning good breeds bad, I think that choosing the wrong dogs or cats and the wrong genetics *can* alter a breed in a short space of time.

If you bred Persians and had 30 happy years of never having a PKD kitten, all that lovely breeding would be wiped out in an instant, by procuring a PKD positive stud who would pass his PKD gene onto 50% of his offspring. So in one generation from having no problem, you are now inundated with them.

I am sure there are many reasons that puppy farmers produce "nasty" dogs but you cannot say that there could not definitely be a genetic reason as well.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

billyboysmammy said:


> Still i am very much of the opinon that cats do inherit behavioural traits from their parents. I think the essense of their personality is inherited, the execution of that behaviour is often taught.


That is my feeling as well.


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> If you bred Persians and had 30 happy years of never having a PKD kitten, all that lovely breeding would be wiped out in an instant, by procuring a PKD positive stud who would pass his PKD gene onto 50% of his offspring.


So where is the gene for temperament? Which is dominant and which is recessive out of good and bad? My whole point is that it isn't as simple as black or white fur. Personality traits are at least polygenic at their simplest.


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## lauren001 (Jun 30, 2008)

havoc said:


> So where is the gene for temperament? Which is dominant and which is recessive out of good and bad? My whole point is that it isn't as simple as black or white fur. Personality traits are at least polygenic at their simplest.


Who said it was a simple inheritance ?

I was making the point that it is possible to alter years of breeding with the wrong choice of cat in one generation, due to bad genetics, a fact which you said was unlikely in the case of puppy breeders.

I would think personality/temperament is almost definitely polygenic. 
The mix defines the personality to some extent and the environment shapes it, is my opinion.

I think that personality/temperament is something which breeders should take account of in their breeding animals and not assume that they can sort it out with their own stamp on the kittens.

I feel that in general, in most established breeds, cats are of good temperament and it is not an issue as far as most breeders are concerned. Even if the stud or dam is a bit feisty, the problem gets ironed out as there are enough with "good" genes to lessen the impact.
However in any breed that loses its focus and will breed anything as long as it meets breed standard or it has the wow factor, then that may be a different matter.


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## Soupie (Sep 2, 2008)

My kittens never mixed with their father but both the silver shaded kittens inherited his habit of padding their paws, purring and sucking their foreleg at the same time. He is 17 months old now and still does it and both kittens are 5 months and still do it.

It's not a learned behaviour as they did not witness him doing it, the other kittens don't do it and mother doesn't do it. Therefore to me it points to some facets of a cats personality and behaviour being genetic......


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## havoc (Dec 8, 2008)

> I was making the point that it is possible to alter years of breeding with the wrong choice of cat in one generation, due to bad genetics, a fact which you said was unlikely in the case of puppy breeders.


I obviously didn't explain it properly. It is extremely simple with a recessive gene which causes a health fault - two beings both carrying a recessive gene means a 1 in 4 chance of that problem manifesting itself. What doesn't seem reasonable is that the same can be said of the whole genetic soup which will determines personality tendencies. That's what they are, tendencies ready to be moulded one way or the other by the environment.


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## noushka05 (Mar 28, 2008)

tellingtails said:


> I am very much an advocate of its the way they are raised, anyone who follows the exploits of Craig the lion man ,knows even wild animals can be tamed.
> 
> Its more a question of understanding your breed,and how to raise,socialise,etc
> 
> ...


oh dear god that man is vile and cruel its a pity it wasnt him one of his tigers mauled instead of the keeper

imo nurture only plays a part in a cats or any animals temperament, breeding from animals with sound dispositions is vital.


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