Viral sensation Venus the two-toned cat still going strong

Updated
Viral Sensation Venus The Two-Toned Cat Still Going Strong
Viral Sensation Venus The Two-Toned Cat Still Going Strong



Two-toned cats aren't really all that strange to see, but what about a two-toned cat with two different eye colors and a face that looks like two cats were combined into one?



Meet Venus the cat. As you can see she has a very distinct face, with black fur and a green eye on one side, and brown fur and a blue eye on the other. Venus was a stray cat before her owner found her back in 2012 wandering around a North Carolina dairy farm.


Post by Venus's Page - Amazing Chimera cat.


Venus quickly became a viral sensation. She, along with her owners Chris and Christine, even stopped by NBC that year to put to rest any rumors that Venus's coloring wasn't authentic.

"Skeptics out there saying you painted her face -"
"We've heard everything from Photoshop to that we dyed her face."
"We can verify, she's 100 percent authentically all kitty, no dye."

So then what type of cat is Venus? It turns out, she may be a mixture of a lot of different breeds of house cat, according to Christina.

Venus's veterinarian believes she is calico-haired underneath, with tortoiseshell fur on the top, and then a mix of orange tabby and black tuxedo thrown in for good measure.

Now Venus hasn't been DNA tested, but that conclusion would mean she is a 'chimera' cat.

Crazy for cats? Take a peek at Grumpy Cat's mug priceless mug:



According to Merriam-Webster, a chimera was a mythological monster made up of several different animals, including a lion, a goat and a snake. Nowadays, a chimera is any type of animal comprised of at least two different types of DNA.

But National Geographic spoke with a professor of cat genetics who says Venus may not necessarily be a chimera, since chimeras tend to be mostly male. Instead she believes Venus's distinct face may have occurred because "the black coloration was randomly activated in all the cells on one side of her face, while the orange coloration was activated on the other, and the two patches met at the midline of her body as she developed."

One thing Venus's owners are pretty sure about, though: she's one of a kind. ABC reports that, "To date, I don't know of any other cat who has as perfect of a line and the two different colored eyes." ​

People all around the world seem to think she's pretty special too. Venus's Facebook page has more than 200,000 likes, while her Instagram account, where new pictures and videos of her are posted almost daily, has around 150,000 followers.

And she even has her very own plush toy. We think it's safe to say that Venus is pretty much the queen of all Internet cats.

More to see:
Are Raju the elephant's tears of joy the real deal?
Fat camps offer pudgy pets 'pawlates' to slim down
Cat attacked by its dinner in viral video

Advertisement