Glitter

Many bengals exhibit ‘glitter’ in their coats. A shiny gold or silver like reflection in their hair, especially seen when they lay out in the sun. And as far as I can tell, especially hard to photograph!!

Some folks believe it is a trait inherited by the Asian Leopard cats they are bred with. But upon further research, this is actually untrue. It looks like when the bengal breed originator Jean Mill started her program, an egyption mau she used in the program introduced the gene.

It is not fully understood how this effect is created though. Most say it is because the hair shaft becomes hollow, and when light passes through it reflects and gives the appearance of glitter. But if you research glitter on cats, you will find many varied ideas, its odd this is not better understood.

Ace’s mum caught a really good shot of his glitter at the Seamus Kitty Blog, best I had seen in awhile. Here are some shots from a forum discussion (Ace’s mum had great shots in there too with Sapphire a snow bengal). The more I look at these photos, the more I wonder why I have not caught many good shots of glitter on Bayou or Asia!!

The other day I was taking a picture of Asia and I accidentally underexposed the first shot. I noticed that her glitter stood out in the dark shot more then I expected.

When I took the photo at a better light setting, the glitter started to fade. I could see it, but its mostly because I was looking for it.

Here are a few close ups. (Don’t forget that you can click on a photo for a larger image)

The tail

The top of her head

…and her cheek.

I am going to have to work on some glitter shots. My photography challenge for the next week. We need to find some super sunbeams and set up cat bed stake outs!