 Purred: Wed Feb 9, '11 1:47pm PST |
 | |  | | Technically, you are a domestic long hair, which means a generic long haired, no-breed cat. Cats are not dogs; the vast majority (over 95%) have no recognizable breed characteristics. What you are, without question, is an absolutely beautiful kitty. Are you really still only three month old? I breed Maine Coons, and their tails do not begin to get fluffy until they are at least four months old. As for your vet's opinion, please remember that vets are not as knowledgeable about cat breeds as they are about dog breeds (partly because dogs, unlike cats, tend to be recognizable breeds or mixes). The real experts on cat breeds are cat show judges, breeders, and cat photographers. At least it seems that the shelter where you got Black Smoke did not specify a breed. Shelters often do this when a cat "looks like" a breed in order to up its chances of getting adopted. Unfortunately, this practice also fosters the impression that most cats have purebred blood and that there are a lot of purebreds in shelters.
Still, Black Smoke is a very special looking kitty. One thing I can say for certain is that I see no Maine Coon influence. Your long fur might come from Maine Coon or Persian ancestors, but your body type resembles neither. What about Turkish Angoras? This breed puzzles me because I see a lot of TAs in cat shows (Japan has some very fine TA breeders), and they are slender cats with medium length, silky fur and extremely erect, close set ears. Yet at some point in the distant past, long haired cats from Turkey and Persia must have traveled to Europe and mated with the moggy population, producing long haired cats who did not look much like their ancestors.
What about Ragdoll? Well, Ragdolls are colorpoint cats, which means they have color on their extremities (ears, feet, etc.). Think Siamese. Ragdolls are very large, heavily boned cats with rectangular bodies. They have small wide set ears and widely set blue eyes. Aside from the fact that Black Smoke seems to be a big boy for his age, I cannot see why anyone would think him part Ragdoll. Ragdolls are becoming popular and more common, but the Nebelung breed is still very rare. It began to be developed in 1984, and is now registered by TICA (one of the two big American cat registries), but not by the CFA (the other big cat registry). Purebreds are usually sold with spay/neuter agreements (which the new owner may not follow...), or sold already desexed. Thus, the chance of purebreds (especially newer breeds) mating with moggies is small. Although I have to agree that Black Smoke has a body/head shape resembling a Nebelung, I would guess that that is a coincidence. Nebelungs have blue (cat world lingo for grey) fur and (ideally) green eyes, since they were partly developed from the Russian Blue breed. My knowledge of cat color genetics is primitive at best, but since there was at least one black cat involved in the development of this breed, one could guess that a Nebelung mated with a black cat might produce a cat like Black Smoke. The chances of that happening, however, I would say are close to nil. Nebelungs are simply too rare. Strange things do happen, however.
I would call Black Smoke a domestic long hair and leave it at that. He may have some interesting genetics in his background, but we'll never know for sure. But he's a gorgeous cat, so enjoy! |  |  | |  |
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