Talk:Calico cat

Wiki Education assignment: Information Literacy and Scholarly Discourse

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 3 October 2023 and 9 December 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Sn2609748 (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Mdefatta.

— Assignment last updated by Bmitch18 (talk) 04:43, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Foreign-language terms

I think all the foreign-language terms listed in the lead should simply be removed. It is not normal at all for a Wikipedia article to include non-English names of things, unless the subject has close national/cultural ties to a particular place/society and the non-English name is therefore especially pertinent and also likely to be encountered in various English-language sources.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  21:29, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

Calico as noun

@Traumnovelle: Please inform me where exactly in this source it says that calico cannot be used as an adjective:

1. in BrE, a heavy, usu. white cotton cloth;
2. in AmE, a light cotton cloth with a small printed pattern; or
3. a blotched, multicolor, or spotted animal, esp. a cat, from the place name for the Indian city of Calicut, dates in English from the late 1500s. The word has always predominantly made the plural calicoes, not ⋆calicos. The feline use is most commonly adjectival—and calico cat isn't seen as redundant. See plurals (d).

Current ratio in print (calicoes vs. ⋆calicos): 5:1

This source tells us unambiguously that the word calico can be used as a noun to describe any animal, but particularly cats, as "calicoes". It then gives the plural and notes that the word is more commonly used as an adjective. Nowhere does it say that calico cannot be used as a noun or that it's ungrammatical ―Howard • 🌽³³ 07:01, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

MOS:BOLDSYN doesn't stipulate we include minor alternate forms, which is why Manx cat, British Shorthair, and Abyssinian cat don't include the name without 'cat' in the lead. This usage isn't included in the OED nor Cambridge either. Traumnovelle (talk) 07:09, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Is the only problem with the lead sentence? In that case we can just remove the content in the lead but retain the content in the etymology and usage section instead of reverting it entirely. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 07:13, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

See WP:NOTDICT, specifically the part about being a usage guide. There is no need to explain this in the article. Traumnovelle (talk) 07:17, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Actually there is; the article switches between using calico cat and calico as a noun frequently. This needs to be explained in the article itself. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 07:18, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

That is an argument to standardise the usage in the article. Even so I am sure a reader can surmise a cat is being referred to. Traumnovelle (talk) 07:22, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Done. ―Howard • 🌽³³ 07:28, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Thank you. Traumnovelle (talk) 07:29, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Dead link replacement: iHeartCats.com article

Hey everyone,

I noticed the link to the iHeartCats.com article (“4 Things You Didn’t Know About Calico Cats”) in the Folklore section is dead — it goes to a 404.

I found a replacement that covers the same topic about Calico cats being considered lucky and kept on ships for good fortune: Catpedia – Calico Cat Color Pattern

It includes info on the Japanese folklore and the maneki-neko connection that seems to match what the old source was used for. Thought it might work as a good replacement. Debbie3000 (talk) 19:26, 10 November 2025 (UTC)

That website is LLM generated and SEO optimised to sell products/referrals, it is not a reliable source. I don't know whether iheartcats.com is a reliable source but simply being dead/unavailable does not mean the source needs to be removed or replaced. Traumnovelle (talk) 19:30, 10 November 2025 (UTC)

That and the iHeartCats article can be found archived on the Wayback Machine: 4 Things You Didn’t Know About Calico Cats Fastashark (talk) 10:04, 22 May 2026 (UTC)

"Mike neko" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Mike neko has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2026 July 20 § Mike neko until a consensus is reached. Steel1943 (talk) 09:19, 20 July 2026 (UTC)