Blog

Today, we’re decoding one of the mysteries of genetics that relates to your Basepaws DNA report of results. It's called epistasis. When epistasis occurs, the observable expression (phenotype) of a gene—such as one responsible for the color of your kitty's coat—gets modified in some way by a completely different gene that has the ability to mask, suppress, or inhibit how that coat color gene is expressed. Epistasis helps explain why sometimes you may get a “likely to have” result for a genetic trait in your cat’s Basepaws report that doesn’t quite match up with their physical appearance.

From time to time, we update the Basepaws digital report of results for our Breed + Health Cat DNA Test. Today, we’d like to take a moment to share some details about two recent changes to our report—one for a genetic health marker linked to the common cat heart condition hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and one for a genetic trait marker associated with the Siamese colorpoint coat pattern.

Feline parvovirus is a virus that can cause cats a lot of discomfort. It is also known as feline panleukopenia, feline infectious enteritis (FIE), and feline distemper. If left untreated, the virus can lead to severe illness and often proves fatal for kittens. Keep reading to find out not only how cats can get parvo, but also how to protect your cat from parvo.