Maine Coons are available in a variety of 75 different color combinations with the exception of pointed patterns and colors. Common colors for Maine Coons include blue, red, black, white, silver, and brown. Maine Coons can be with white patches of varying degrees or a completely solid color with no white. Maine Coons Patterns are separate from the coat’s color, the accepted patterns are classic, mackerel, spotted/ticked, solid, and torbie.

Solid coat colors in cats. Photography ©Thinkstock Images.

SOLID Colors

Genetically there are four basic solid colors of cats: black, chocolate, cinnamon and red. All other solid colors are modifications of these. Red is a form of tabby as it is impossible to completely eliminate the tabby markings.

Why are there not five basic colors? White is counted as an absence of color rather than a color.

Different countries, registries and breeds have different names for some of the same basic colours. Even where the same name is used, there may be different views on what is an acceptable or ideal version of that color. Colors that appear identical to the human eye are caused by different genetic interactions.

The same colors are called by different names in different breeds. Even in the same breed, the color may have different names depending on which country the cat comes from and which registry it is registered with. American registries like to add "mink" after the Tonkinese colors whereas British registries use the same name for that color as is used in the equivalent Siamese or Burmese colour. Confused? Don't worry - there are some cross-reference tables later on!

The jet-black colour you known as "black" is called "ebony" and "ebony tabby" in Orientals, "black" in solid coloured domestic shorthairs, "brown" when it refers to brown tabby domestic shorthairs, "bronze" in Egyptian Maus, "tawny" in Ocicats and "ruddy" in Abyssinians. In colour-pointed cats, "black" is called "seal". In Burmese it is "sable" or "seal sepia" and in American Tonkinese it is "cinnamon" or "natural mink". In the Asian breed (self Burmese cats) it has a breed name to itself "Bombay". Shaded silvers, black smokes and chinchilla cats may look various shades of grey or silver, but they are black cats with silver roots to their fur. Add dilution and it becomes "blue". Modify the dilution and it becomes "caramel". Yet it is still basically a black cat.

The dilute gene must be present in both the sire and dam’s pedigree in order to produce dilute offspring.

White

Black

Red

Blue

Cream

Bi-Colors

A bicolor cat or piebald Maine Coon Cat is a cat with white fur combined with fur of some other color, for example, black or tabby. There are various patterns of a bicolor cat. These range from a Turkish Van pattern (color on the crown of the head and the tail only) through to solid color with a throat locket.

BLACK & WHITE
BLUE & WHITE
RED & WHITE
CREAM & WHITE

Parti-Colors

"Tortoiseshell" is typically reserved for particolored cats with relatively small or no white markings. Those that are largely white with tortoiseshell patches are described as tricolor, tortoiseshell-and-white (in the United Kingdom), or calico (in Canada and the United States)

Colors in this category:

TORTOISESHELL
BLUE-CREAM

Shell, Shaded, Smoke

What is a smoke color cat?

Smoke Color Maine Coons are a solid color cat that carries the inhibitor gene which suppresses the color in the hair shaft. This means that the cat's hairs are dark (usually black) at the tips but have much lighter colored bands near the bottom. All solid colors can be affected by the inhibitor gene which labels them “Smoke” plus the underlining solid color.

Example: Solid Blue + Inhibitor Gene = Blue Smoke
Example: Solid Red + Inhibitor Gene = Red Smoke

How to tell the difference between the shaded, shell, and silver cats?