21 days old
At 21 days of age you can see that the
kitten has started entering into the "fuzzy" stages. Her pattern
components are clearly seperating from one another with a greater
amount of ground color showing. The medial canthus has opened and
seperated which is a leading point for me in the selection of a marble
in my breeding program. The lateral canthus of the pattern is barely
touching. The black pigment expression has already started to change at
21 days and the center of the pattern components are rapidly dropping
out thier centers creating a 3rd color. The black borders around these
components are starting to be interrupted as the the pattern
develops. Here at Roman Bengals, I would like to
NOT
see so much of the pattern dropping out already at this age. My belief
is that if the pattern drops out too quickly you will lose your third
color and black expression. These are two very important expressions
that we want to preserve and maintain in our marble program.
6 weeks of age
Immense changes have taken place from 3 weeks to 6 weeks as you can
see. She is in the full "fuzzy" stage at this point. Black expression
has changed completely on the main body while the leg markings have
retained most if not all of thier black pigmentation. Notice the island
rosettes on her back legs and how much darker the borders are compared
to the center body pattern. The pattern components have distanced
themselves even further from one another giving a much more balance and
contrast to the overall pattern. If you notice in the markings on the
mid-body you can see that the centers have "fallen out" alot. The
borders around each component has been infiltrated by the center third
color instead of maintaining a nice thick, black border except for the
back leg island rosettes. The borders have not been infiltrated by the
center color. Note the space at the medial canthus continues to open
breaking up the dreaded bullseye or eye. In this picture also you can
see that the lateral canthus is still just barely touching the other
components.
9 weeks of age
Between 6 and 9 weeks the pattern components continue to "drift" away
from eachother allowing more ground color or acreage to be present.
Note that now the lateral canthus has disconnected from the iris
component. It's very obvious now how much of the black
pigmentation has diluted leaving a rust color in it's place. The
pattern is still in possession of it's distinct borders though you can
see that the contrast is much less than before and the borders and
center color are starting to blend into eachother in some pattern
components. Notice here that the black expression is still present on
the lower extremeties of the leg markings as well as on the tail. Their
is also a clear gradiation of black expression from the center of the
body to the extremeties. Black expression is something that has
been quite difficult to retain in many marbles. My theory is the more
black, the longer it stays, the less you'll lose conterast as the
bengal matures. I am looking for the black hairs to be selfed, which
means that they are entirely black from tip to skin rather than just
black tipped hairs.
20 weeks of age
You can really start to see the clear gradient in black pigmentation in
this large jump between 9 weeks and 20 weeks. The rosetted
islands are still showing very nice black borders without any loss of
contrast with the tricoloration from the centers. The clear gold ground
color taken on a slightly darker wheaten color and is showing excellent
contrast overall. Her previous black borders on some pattern components
have continued to become more dilute. Marmorina is a gorgeous
marble as you can see even though her pigmentation has changed more
than I would have liked to have seen. Notice her beautiful whited
underbody with the black leg markings. Beautiful!
6 months of age
While at 6 months Marmorina is far from finishing to develop we can
safely say that she's a stunner! Further dilution of black pigmentation
across her pattern is clearly visible in this photo. Front leg markings
up to the chest still show clear black expression. Tail and back legs
as well. Note as you move up her back thigh towards the iris of
her pattern it goes from black to increasingly lighter shades in the
borders. The rosetted islands on her back leg still sport full black
expression in the borders with the beautiful centers adding contrast
and drama. Her centers of the pattern components have fallen out all
over and continue to maintain a tri color patterning we desire in the
marbles. The borders, even those that have become diluted are
still clearly distinguishable throughout. On her rib and upper
eyelid pattern component toward the medial canthus they have lost some
of thier definition and borders though nothing tragic. Overall I
am very happy with how Marmorina has developed. Her development
has given me alot to think about and given me focal points in which I
need to address in my breeding program to attain my breeding goals.
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