I am disappointed with this one, not disappointed in the fact that Amaretto has been mated, but unfortunately it was by the wrong boy. Let me tell you what happened......................Amaretto hadn't called for 12 months, we weren't bothered because we knew when she was ready she would call, and if she did, we'd mate her, if not, then we'd just wait and see. So when she came into call on the 20th, we were delighted because we had plans to mate her with Tuaca. Up until this point in time, Tuaca hadn't mated anyone, although he had constantly been trying it on with Nocello who is far to young to be calling but that didn't stopping him trying bless him. So when Retto came into call, she and Tuaca were put in Graham's room together starting from the morning on June 21. This was Retto's 2nd day of calling and she was starting to get to full throttle. What did Tuaca do...................nothing, not a darn thing. While she called, he slept, while she screamed at him, he turned his back and walked away. All day we watched and waited but he had no interest in her whatsoever. We left them together all night in the hopes that she might be able to convince him that honeymoons are indeed fun. By 12 noon on the 22, we came to the conclusion that Tuaca just wasn't ready yet to be a man, and he is a mere 8 months old, so we aren't panicking as I know when he feels he is ready to become a man, then he will manage it. We couldn't put it off any longer though because this was now Day 3 of the call and Retto would be at her most fertile, so we removed Tuaca from the room, and put Ashanti in. In typical Ashanti fashion, within 14 minutes he had mated her, by 1447 he had mated her a total of 6 times! That's my man :) Anyway, the reason I was disappointed is that I would dearly love to breed some Chocolate Torties again. We have only ever bred one Chocolate Tortie girl, Gr Pr Schimmel Chilli Tequila, and even though I personally would never share my home with any Tortie other than a Black, I love the rich colouring of the Chocolates and would love a litter of them. A mating between Amaretto and Tuaca would have given us the possibility of Chocolate Torties. Remember that red is a sex linked gene and when you mate a solid girl to a red boy, you will get red boys and tortie girls. There would have been an extremely strong possibility of chocolate torties in there because Amaretto is obviously a Havana, and Tuaca is a red out of Sheridans (Chocolate Point Siamese) and Toussaint (Oriental Black Tortie carrying Chocolate) so Tuaca is definitely a chocolate carrier. It won't be the end of the world though as there will always be other matings when Tuaca comes of age. This mating between Ashanti and Amaretto unfortunately will be rather "boring" when it comes to colours. Ashanti is not a chocolate carrier, so all we will really be looking at will be Brown (Black) Oriental Tabbies and Oriental Blacks. I really do not know what pattern the Tabbies will be as it solely depends on which agouti gene Amaretto may carry, something I will not know until the babies are born. So I guess, on that score, it will be interesting and let's face it, the possibility of yet more mini Ashanti's running around the home is something that will always delight me :) I didn't take any honeymoon photos at all this time around, which I'm sure some of you will actually be pleased about ;) We should know approximately July 15 whether or not we will be expecting another Ashanti litter so please do check back then for further updates.