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Breeding Bambino Sphynx?

NekkidIzUs

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So I know a lot of people don't like Bambinos, but I think they are precious. I was wondering if someone would be willing to help me understand the genetics behind breeding them and starting a new line of them. Please only helpful answers here. I am not saying I am going to breed I just want to understand how it works. I understand the basics of ourcrossing so I would like to know how it applies to Bambinos. Thanks!
 

susi794

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I don't know, but you should be able to google it and find out the specifics....I think it is a sphynx crossed with a munchkin? Not sure though....I'm sure other people can tell you....
 

ElGatoLoco

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I don't even understand the basics of outcrossing. But my breeder has a few bambinos. I could refer you to her via a PM if you'd like?
 

admin

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Yes, I think it is a mix between a sphynx and a munchkin as Bellasmom said. Some say there are health issues like back curvatures problems, etc. I'm not sure nor have I investigated that deep, do your homework first as with any pet. Our member Pooner has just bought one, maybe she will shed some light, they are no doubt little cuties!
 

BaldKarma

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i was in the market for a sphynx or bambino and up until sunday and while the bambino was a lil extra money but worth it in my eyes when you are already spending the amount you spend on a sphynx,i decided to wait a few year i was nervous about long term health issues in such a new breed but in a few years i will deff buy a bambino with out a doubt.
 

xxx_phoenix_xxx

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they are cute but i too would be nervouse of health isues i'm sure you will find the info you need somewhere sorry i could not be of any help but good luck:ThumbsUp: x
 

pooner

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I just got a little girl bambino, Yoni Roloff, she is a sweet girl. Personality just like a sphynx but little munchkin legs. I've heard of some health risks with bambino spines and possible hip problems. Seems to be the same risks that are in the munchkin breed. Yes, bambino is a sphynx crossed with munchkin. People worry that they will have issues like the daschund dog however cats have flexible spines which helps reduce some of the risks dogs have.
The breed is very controversial but I just love her! She amazes me how well she gets around, she can jump almost anywhere. I have placed more things around for her to have steps to get up to window sills etc.

lady bug toy stance.jpg

 
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Marnasobsession

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Good for you! Unless someone else wrote the check for her it does not matter what their opinion is. I have gotten a ration of crap over my sphynx over the years. I am getting a savannah from Trish at the end of May and people have had a fit because they are a "wild" animal. You are informed about the breed and a good mommy. To heck with them all who have a problem with the breed. Sry for the lecture but I am feeling really tired of ignorant people and their comments. To each his own.:Hysterical:
 

HeatherL

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I have two bambinos and two sphynx at the time. and my bambinos are every bit as healthy as my sphynx, and though I love them both the same, the bambinos are slightly more cuddly !
 

Retro Kitty

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My first concern would be combining two relatively new breeds and here’s why. It takes years of outcrossing to strengthen a new breed. Munchkins have only been around since the 90’s. They’ve only been a TICA championship breed since 2003. Sphynx have been around longer but it is a recessive trait so more inbreeding was necessary to keep reproducing them. Responsible breeders testing for genetic defects like HCM and a broader genetic pool of unrelated cats are definitely helping to strengthen the breed but part of me feels like we have further to go before bringing in dwarfism. That’s just my opinion.

That said, here’s a little basic genetic info of how Bambinos are made. (I’m going to try my best to not make this confusing!)

Each parent cat has 2 genes per trait that they can pass to the kitten. Upper case letters will represent dominant traits and lower case letters represent the normal wild type gene. I’ll use the letters M for Munchkin and S for Sphynx.

Munchkin’s short legs are a dominant trait. A dominant trait will be visible when only one copy of the gene is present. So simply, if you breed a Munchkin to a Domestic Shorthair they can produce short legged cats and normal legged cats. Only kittens carrying one Munchkin gene will survive. This means the kittens with short legs (Mm) will carry one short leg gene (M) and one normal leg gene (m). Having two Munchkin genes (MM) is fatal.

Sphynx’s hairlessness is a recessive trait. It will only be visible when a cat has two copies of the Sphynx gene. So if you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Domestic Shorthair (ss) you will only get furry cats. But these furry cats will now carry one hairless Sphynx gene (Ss). This is called heterozygous (carrying one copy of the special trait and one copy of the wild type trait). You can get kittens with two copies of the hairless gene (SS) by breeding one heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to a hairless Sphynx (SS) or by breeding a heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to another heterozygous furry cat (Ss).

So how do you make a Bambino from “scratch"?
If you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Munchkin (Mm) you will get a litter of furry kittens who all carry the hairless gene. About half of them will have short legs. You keep the ones with the short legs (MmSs) and breed them to an unrelated Sphynx. Again, the litter has a 50% chance of having short legs but this time you have a chance of some being hairless (SS). So theoretically you could get Bambinos (MmSS). The tricky thing is the hairlessness. A fourth generation hairless Sphynx is considered pure (F4) and will not look the same as a “hairless†second generation outcross (F2). You will have to keep our best short legged hairless kitten from each litter and breed it to an unrelated Sphynx until you get a bald cat with short legs.

What if you just get 2 Bambinos and breed them?
Since the dominant short legged trait is fatal when two copies are present (fatal homozygous) the embryos with 2 copies would die. This is a huge problem since kittens are born in litters. If the majority of the embryos die it is very likely that the entire litter including kittens that would have otherwise been healthy will be aborted.

So there’s the boring science behind it!
 

Misty0414

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My first concern would be combining two relatively new breeds and here’s why. It takes years of outcrossing to strengthen a new breed. Munchkins have only been around since the 90’s. They’ve only been a TICA championship breed since 2003. Sphynx have been around longer but it is a recessive trait so more inbreeding was necessary to keep reproducing them. Responsible breeders testing for genetic defects like HCM and a broader genetic pool of unrelated cats are definitely helping to strengthen the breed but part of me feels like we have further to go before bringing in dwarfism. That’s just my opinion.

That said, here’s a little basic genetic info of how Bambinos are made. (I’m going to try my best to not make this confusing!)

Each parent cat has 2 genes per trait that they can pass to the kitten. Upper case letters will represent dominant traits and lower case letters represent the normal wild type gene. I’ll use the letters M for Munchkin and S for Sphynx.

Munchkin’s short legs are a dominant trait. A dominant trait will be visible when only one copy of the gene is present. So simply, if you breed a Munchkin to a Domestic Shorthair they can produce short legged cats and normal legged cats. Only kittens carrying one Munchkin gene will survive. This means the kittens with short legs (Mm) will carry one short leg gene (M) and one normal leg gene (m). Having two Munchkin genes (MM) is fatal.

Sphynx’s hairlessness is a recessive trait. It will only be visible when a cat has two copies of the Sphynx gene. So if you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Domestic Shorthair (ss) you will only get furry cats. But these furry cats will now carry one hairless Sphynx gene (Ss). This is called heterozygous (carrying one copy of the special trait and one copy of the wild type trait). You can get kittens with two copies of the hairless gene (SS) by breeding one heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to a hairless Sphynx (SS) or by breeding a heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to another heterozygous furry cat (Ss).

So how do you make a Bambino from “scratch"?
If you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Munchkin (Mm) you will get a litter of furry kittens who all carry the hairless gene. About half of them will have short legs. You keep the ones with the short legs (MmSs) and breed them to an unrelated Sphynx. Again, the litter has a 50% chance of having short legs but this time you have a chance of some being hairless (SS). So theoretically you could get Bambinos (MmSS). The tricky thing is the hairlessness. A fourth generation hairless Sphynx is considered pure (F4) and will not look the same as a “hairless†second generation outcross (F2). You will have to keep our best short legged hairless kitten from each litter and breed it to an unrelated Sphynx until you get a bald cat with short legs.

What if you just get 2 Bambinos and breed them?
Since the dominant short legged trait is fatal when two copies are present (fatal homozygous) the embryos with 2 copies would die. This is a huge problem since kittens are born in litters. If the majority of the embryos die it is very likely that the entire litter including kittens that would have otherwise been healthy will be aborted.

So there’s the boring science behind it!


So now what happens when you have a sphynx that’s half sphynx and half bambino and you breed to a male bambino? Would you end up with even more mutation having too much bambino?
 

Yoda mom

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@Misty0414 definitely a good question for a responsible breeder .
Genetics is a very tricky thing
As with dogs there are certain combinations you abosultely do not want to breed
(Like Merle to Merle Aussie )

Breeding cats with different genetics be have lethal combinations or life long health issues
 

Shay

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My first concern would be combining two relatively new breeds and here’s why. It takes years of outcrossing to strengthen a new breed. Munchkins have only been around since the 90’s. They’ve only been a TICA championship breed since 2003. Sphynx have been around longer but it is a recessive trait so more inbreeding was necessary to keep reproducing them. Responsible breeders testing for genetic defects like HCM and a broader genetic pool of unrelated cats are definitely helping to strengthen the breed but part of me feels like we have further to go before bringing in dwarfism. That’s just my opinion.

That said, here’s a little basic genetic info of how Bambinos are made. (I’m going to try my best to not make this confusing!)

Each parent cat has 2 genes per trait that they can pass to the kitten. Upper case letters will represent dominant traits and lower case letters represent the normal wild type gene. I’ll use the letters M for Munchkin and S for Sphynx.

Munchkin’s short legs are a dominant trait. A dominant trait will be visible when only one copy of the gene is present. So simply, if you breed a Munchkin to a Domestic Shorthair they can produce short legged cats and normal legged cats. Only kittens carrying one Munchkin gene will survive. This means the kittens with short legs (Mm) will carry one short leg gene (M) and one normal leg gene (m). Having two Munchkin genes (MM) is fatal.

Sphynx’s hairlessness is a recessive trait. It will only be visible when a cat has two copies of the Sphynx gene. So if you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Domestic Shorthair (ss) you will only get furry cats. But these furry cats will now carry one hairless Sphynx gene (Ss). This is called heterozygous (carrying one copy of the special trait and one copy of the wild type trait). You can get kittens with two copies of the hairless gene (SS) by breeding one heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to a hairless Sphynx (SS) or by breeding a heterozygous furry cat (Ss) to another heterozygous furry cat (Ss).

So how do you make a Bambino from “scratch"?
If you breed a Sphynx (SS) to a Munchkin (Mm) you will get a litter of furry kittens who all carry the hairless gene. About half of them will have short legs. You keep the ones with the short legs (MmSs) and breed them to an unrelated Sphynx. Again, the litter has a 50% chance of having short legs but this time you have a chance of some being hairless (SS). So theoretically you could get Bambinos (MmSS). The tricky thing is the hairlessness. A fourth generation hairless Sphynx is considered pure (F4) and will not look the same as a “hairless†second generation outcross (F2). You will have to keep our best short legged hairless kitten from each litter and breed it to an unrelated Sphynx until you get a bald cat with short legs.

What if you just get 2 Bambinos and breed them?
Since the dominant short legged trait is fatal when two copies are present (fatal homozygous) the embryos with 2 copies would die. This is a huge problem since kittens are born in litters. If the majority of the embryos die it is very likely that the entire litter including kittens that would have otherwise been healthy will be aborted.

So there’s the boring science behind it!
What if a bambino (MmSs) is bred with a typical hairless Sphynx (SS)
 

Catzzzmeow

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Both breeds carry their own health/hereditary concerns so they should not be bred. It also contributes to the issue of backyard breeding which has diminished the lifespan of this amazing breed. @Shay


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 

Atomic Cat mom

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This might be obvious but not to me so I apologize in advance … so I would like to know if I could breed a bambino to a long legged half bambino or do I need to do the dna test first ?
 

Catzzzmeow

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They should not be bred. The post in this thread is a great reference as to why it shouldn’t be done…so it’s great you are researching. Breeding is quite complicated and now with gene pools being mixed with bambino, dwelf, skinderlops etc it makes it even more difficult and can lead to backyard breeders. Do you have a breeder that might be able to be your mentor? @Atomic Cat mom
 

Atomic Cat mom

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They should not be bred. The post in this thread is a great reference as to why it shouldn’t be done…so it’s great you are researching. Breeding is quite complicated and now with gene pools being mixed with bambino, dwell, skinderlops etc it makes it even more difficult and can lead to backyard breeders. Do you have a breeder that might be able to be your mentor? @Atomic Cat mom
Wow I really appreciate your warm welcome on my very first post in Sphynxlair ! I was asking for the genetics aspects of breeding Bambinos/Sphynx .im not interested in Dwelfs as you put it or Skinderlops ! If you have genetic knowledge or understand the genome please do share ! I don’t know but from what I have gathered about Backyard Breeder ,Health is not a concern in any way and their program if they have one it’s based on Monetary RETURNS which in my opinion breeding should be about Love and strengthening the breed not Money in any way you should have the money FIRST generally they Do not ! That is what I have found . However since you want to jump in and start throwing around the term Backyard Breeder PLEASE by all means explain what it means since you want so badly to shine your intelligence and moral standing and also how it applies to the content of my post !!! To refresh you I posted a question about the genetics of Bambinos and I wanted to join in on the conversation because I just joined Sphynxlair obviously You replied to Virtue signal and Bully,NICE !
 
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Catzzzmeow

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I am not an expert of the breed’s genes, but from the piece that was shared earlier in the thread I thought it was well worded. I did say it was great that you are researching as many do not. I am one person that has never been accused of being a bully…I apologize that it came off that way to you. I hope someone will be able to help you out. @Atomic Cat mom
 

Yoda mom

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@Atomic Cat mom , glad you are doing your research. what is the long legged half bambino a mix of?sphynx? I would think a DNA test of both would be appropriate along with regular HCM heart scans, etc. breeding is not for the faint of heart, complicated when crossbreeding and some should not be breed because of gene differences, skeletal and or or hereditary complications and expensive to do right by the breed. I would certainly reach out to a reputable bambino breeder (you can check TICA for breeders and perhaps find a mentor? )
surely members will chime in.

here is a helpful thread with info on sphynx
. sure there is similar for bambino that a mentor could share info on.

retrokitty's reply above has helpful info

here are some bambino health problems I found

Common Health Problems​

Because the bambino is such a new breed, the extent of its genetic health problems is not yet known. However, it is safe to assume it may be prone to issues that affect both the sphynx and munchkin breeds. These include:


  • Lordosis: This condition can occur in any cat, but it is more prevalent in the munchkin. It involves the spine excessively curving inwards, putting pressure on vital organs. It can be fatal in some cases.
  • Pectus excavatum: This is another condition seen in munchkins. The breastbone caves in, causing various issues including respiratory problems, loss of appetite, and weight loss.
  • Hereditary myopathy: This condition of generalized muscle weakness affects sphynx cats.
 
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