Scottish Fold osteochondrodysplasia is an inherited bone and cartilage disorder specific for this cat breed. It belongs in a wider group of disorders, generally known as osteochondrodysplasia, but the form occurring in the Scottish Fold breed is specific by its causative mutation. Osteochondrodysplasia is a disorder (”dysplasia”) of bones (”osteo”) and cartilage (”chondro”). It can be characterized into a group of musculoskeletal disorders, a broad category of diseases that affects the muscles or bones. Cats can have other issues associated with this disorder, like stiffness in joints, deformed legs and toes, thickened and inflexible tails and accelerated progressive osteoarthritis. Cats with two copies of the gene are likely to have more severe symptoms.

*** This is an opportunity to discuss selective breeding in cats and dogs and whether it is ethical to breed animals with known genetic disorders that are painful for the animal.

Source: https://icatcare. org/advice/cat-health/scottish-fold -disease-%E2%80%93-osteochondrodysp lasia

Students may also wonder if normal cats (ee) can only have normal offspring, then where did the first Scottish fold come from. This is a good time to remind them that DNA can spontaneously mutate and likely it was just a random mutation.