Breeding – Page 4 – cagaran.co.uk

Catching Up

The first update for several months – lots of shows, GCCF centenary dinner and discussion forums, London Pet Show, the Ocicat seminar and several AGMs. Also an update on our breeding plans – Katie and Kia are both pregnant, and Dàrna will be going to stud soon.

Finally, a new update! Apologies to those who have emailed to ask if everything is okay. Whenever I came on to write an update, I found myself just looking at the photos of B-B, and never getting any further. However, I think it’s time to try and move on, so I’ll try to bring this up to date with our news. I’ll break it down into sections, though, so that you can read as little or as much as you want!

Ghost

You may remember Ghost – he was the third of Dàrna’s kittens, and the biggest in the litter. He found a home with a lovely family down in Barrow-in-Furness, who collected him between Christmas and New Year. They breed Chihuahuas, but wanted a cat for their youngest child, Jack. Unfortunately, Jack turned out to have a severe cat allergy (so severe that he was stopping breathing during the night!), and we have therefore taken him back. The improvement in Jack’s symptoms has been almost instantaneous, so there is certainly no chance of him going back home.

We are therefore looking for a new home for him. He is currently eight months old, and sometimes behaves very much like a kitten, but is generally just that bit quieter and less boisterous. His family obviously took great care of him, because he is very loving – his favourite place is wrapped around your neck like a scarf! Obviously, he is used to dogs (all-be-it small ones), but has lived as an only cat for several months, so is a bit unsure of other cats. We are currently in the process of re-introducing him to ours, though, so hopefully he’ll get over that soon enough.

Ghost looking cute in his basket — Ghost in the basket on the scratching post

We will be looking after him until a new home is found, but he is still owned by Jane and her family. Prospective owners are more than welcome to visit him here, but any money would be going to Jane, who is hoping for £250 for him. He is fully vaccinated through to next Christmas and is up-to-date with flea and worming treatments.

Ghost showing off his beautiful plumey tail — Ghost showing his beautiful tail

You can see Jane’s comments on what he is like to live with, on the new ‘re-homing’ page on our website. This page was created purely to help find this beautiful big kitten his perfect new home, so please feel free to send the link to anyone whom you think might be interested in him.

Ghost curled up asleep — Cute Ghost looking very kittenish whilst asleep

The First ‘Cagaran Certificate’ – Lainni’s First PC

Our first litter are now officially adult, having turned 9 months in late March. The Nor’East of Scotland show was held on the 14th of this month, and Lona brought Lainni down to that. She looked lovely on the day, and won her BOB and also the Premier Certificate – the first certificate for the Cagaran prefix (hopefully the first of many)!

Lainni in her pen at Dundee — Lainni in her pen at the Nor'East

I was working on the table at the show, so didn’t get a chance to handle Lainni, but I stopped to say hello whenever I passed her pen, and every time she fell over sideways trying to rub herself against my hand through the bars – what a sweetie. Lona is obviously making a great job of raising her!

London Pet Show

The first London Pet Show was held at Olympia on the 7th and 8th of May. It was the first event of its kind in London, and I hope that it becomes an annual event. The show was split into five ‘zones’ for different types of animal – dogs, cats, exotics, small furries and aquatics. As part of the cat section, the GCCF had been offered a space in which to showcase our many breeds and what the GCCF does.

Richard and I attended on the Saturday, taking Fiona to represent the Asians, and Kia to represent the Ocicats. We were lucky enough to be joined by a second representative in each case – a Bombay alongside Fiona, and a lovely Ocicat (spotted) with Kia. As well as the owners of those cats, Anita came with us to help man both stands.

The Ocicat and Asian stands from above — 'Our' stands from above - the Ocicat is facing the camera, and the Asian is facing away from the camera, behind and to the right of the Ocicat stand. Fi is the little creamy patch in the right-hand pen!

The day was a huge success, with thousands of people coming around and asking all sorts of questions about our breeds. Fiona looked adorable playing with a feather stick in her pen, and talking to people walking past, but it was Kia who was really in her element, thoroughly enjoying performing for the public. We had her out on her harness, dancing around after a feather stick, and drawing a huge crowd watching and taking photos.

She was so relaxed out that she ended up going over to have a shot at the agility, which she definitely enjoyed, though she was more keen on running through the tunnels than tackling the other obstacles – she kept running around the jumps and stairs on one side to go through the tunnel at one end, and then running around the other side to go through the tunnel at the other end!

Kia going through a hoop on the agility course — Kia being shown how to 'do the hoop' on the agility course

I would highly recommend this show if they do it again in the future, and would undoubtedly attend again, even if it does mean a crazy drive to London with cats in tow! I was really disappointed to see that the Abyssinians were not represented at all – the breeders missed a real opportunity to introduce the breed to the public. I would have hated our Tiffanies or Ocicats to be in the same position – the show was just the most fantastic chance to show off our beautiful breeds, and answer the public’s questions on them, and I couldn’t be more pleased that we did it.

Ocicat Seminar

The Ocicat Seminar was held near Banbury on the 15th of May. This was a fantastic opportunity for breeders and judges alike, to gain an understanding of what the Ocicat breed should look like. There were lots of beautiful examples of the breed on show, from a tiny kitten right up to an Imperial-titled adult. The theme/focus of the seminar was the ‘wild look’ that the Ocicat should have, with the day aiming to give an understanding of the Ocicat in general, but in particular how the proper wild look is achieved.

The presentations started with an Ocicat Ivory, which is a pointed Ocicat – these occur occasionally in Ocicat litters, as a result of the recessive pointed gene coming through from their Siamese ancestors. These beautiful cats have most of their pigment restricted to their heads, tails and legs, like the Siamese, but they also usually show tabby ‘ghost markings’ on their sides. In this case, the Ivory was being used to demonstrate how it is not only the spots of the Ocicat that give it the wild look, but also the ‘type’ (the body structure).

Rosemary Caunter (Thickthorn Ocicats) was the presenter, and she started by joking that this was one she had washed the spots off to allow us to see the type without the distraction of the pattern. Using an Ivory was a great way to show that an Ocicat has a specific body type, and should therefore still look like an Ocicat, even if it doesn’t have the Ocicat pattern. Rosemary then brought out her Imperial-titled girl, Thickthorn Lotus Blossom. Lotus is a beautiful chocolate (spotted) Ocicat, and showed perfectly what an Ocicat should look like once you put the spots back on!

Lotus demonstrating the proper Ocicat 'look' and beautiful pattern

Rosemary demonstrating the correct Ocicat head type with Lotus — Lotus being used as a model to demonstrate correct Ocicat head type

Rosemary was followed by Stacie Shorten (Ameeka Abyssinians & Ocicats), who is Kia’s breeder. She was talking about the Ocicat Classic, and how its pattern differs from the Ocicat, but the type remains the same. She used two of her Ocicat Classics as demonstrators – Kia’s mum, Jazzy (Thickthorn Calypso), and Kia’s ¾ brother, Dragon (Ameeka Dragonfire).

Ameeka Dragonfire modelling the Ocicat Classic pattern — Dragon modelling not only the Ocicat Classic pattern, but also that nosey temperament

Stacie Shorten and Ameeka Dragonfire — Stacie demonstrating one of the other major purposes of attending a breed seminar - having a laugh with friends!

Aside from the presentations, we also had a delicious lunch and a good chance to catch up with or meet lots of the other people involved with the Ocicat breed. Breed seminars really are a great place for both gaining a greater understanding of a breed, catching up with existing cat fancy friends and making new ones.

Other ‘Cat Activities’

We have attended quite a number of shows since the Scottish, all the way back in February, with varying success as always.

The Scottish was followed a fortnight later, by the Coventry and Leicester, which is down in Warwickshire. We had taken Dàrna and Xaria, the latter having been entered in this show before she won her fifth and final Imperial at the Scottish. Dàrna won her second Reserve Grand, and Xaria didn’t pick up anything at all, but she’s already an Imperial, so that really didn’t matter. I had an enjoyable morning stewarding for Marlene Buckeridge, though I had to leave her in the afternoon to attend the AGM for the AGCS. Thankfully we had finished most of our classes by then, and I’m grateful that she allowed me to go.

The week after the Coventry and Leicester, we were back down in the Midlands for the Ocicat Club’s AGM, which is always an enjoyable event. It starts with a delicious meal and lots of chat and hilarity, before moving on to the official business. The next week we were south again, though not quite as far, for the Lancashire, which is in Wigan, where Dàrna won yet another Reserve Grand and Best of Breed.

We had also taken Breckin – her first time out as a neuter, and she won the Premier Certificate and Best of Breed. Anita was also there with Keela in what was her first show, since we didn’t manage to get her into the AGCS. Keela looked utterly adorable, and was cuddling up to the judges. She also won her 1st Open and Best of Breed.

At the Lancs show, I was chatting to our friend, Olive Holt (Nemorez Asians and Burmese), and found out that her partner, Ian, was ill. Olive was supposed to be getting two new stud boys from Sarah Davidson (Karakoram Burmese and Asians) in Fife, but since Ian normally does the driving for Olive, and Sarah doesn’t drive, transport for the boys was proving an issue. Sarah only lives about 40 minutes from us, and I was due to be down in Liverpool for a meeting on Tuesday morning.

Since I have had an open invitation to stay at Olive’s virtually since we first met a couple of years ago, I suggested that if I could stay with Olive on the Monday evening, I could bring the boys down then, and drive on from her in the morning. This idea was gratefully received, so we collected the boys on Sunday evening, had them stay overnight in our back bedroom (which isn’t accessible to our own cats), and then I dropped them off with Olive on the Monday.

Ziggy looking pensive — One of the boys, Ziggy, looking pensively at the camera

A fortnight later we had a further reduction in show travelling distance, with a trip to Preston for the Preston and Blackpool. Dàrna didn’t win anything that day, because the awards went to the lovely Freya (GR CH Inyanga Instant Karma), owned by our friend Sue Dykes (Kashi Tibetan Terriers and Kashican Cats).

Fiona, on the other hand, had another exceptional day, winning her 1st Open and Best of Breed, but then going on to take Best Foreign Kitten and then Overall Best Foreign. Joyce Green then shortlisted her down to the last three for Overall Best in Show, finally giving it to the most beautiful and enormous British Black, but in the meantime the stewards had to stand there holding little Fi in the middle, with the British Black on one side and a stunning Seal Point Siamese on the other!

We then had a three week gap before the marathon journey to Devon for the Asian Cat Association show. Once again, Dàrna didn’t come away with anything, but we had rather expected that due to the quality of the other cats and the fact that she was in full season and therefore out of condition.

Unfortunately, Fi was also coming into season for the first time, and decided to shout very loudly whenever she was taken out of her pen. We decided to withdraw her from judging in case her shouting upset the other cats. This was obviously incredibly disappointing in light of the distances travelled, but that’s part of the risk of showing – the cats don’t always do what we want them to! We finished the day with a mad dash back up the road, in order to be home in time to attend the West of Scotland AGM on the Sunday.

Another one-week gap, and we were down to help Shirley show Monty for the first time, at the joint show of the Bedford and District and Cambridgeshire Cat Clubs. This is one of the shows held at the Woodgreen Animal Shelter near Huntingdon, which has to be one of the best show venues, always a pleasure to attend. Monty took his Best of Breed and also another Reserve Grand, which was great, but even better was seeing Shirley and Kili experiencing showing for the first time. Kili was absolutely ecstatic with Monty’s wins, and stood by his pen telling anyone who would listen that he was her cat, with the sort of obvious pride that only a child can display.

The show also turned out to be the venue for one of the GCCF’s ‘consultation forums’ on the proposed changes to the show structure and judging scheme. This was a good opportunity to hear more about the executive committee’s plans for the structure of the show sections (Semi-Longhair, Foreign etc.) and also the alterations that will hopefully be made to the way in which judges are trained.

It was good to see a decent number of people getting involved, and lots of valid questions were asked and answered. These events are being held in various locations around the country, to give the exhibitors from each area a chance to comment – we attended another at the Durham show a week past on Saturday, and a third at the Merseyside on the weekend just gone. If you are involved in the GCCF at all, I recommend attending one – I know that the Scottish one is to be at the Edinburgh show in July, if that’s relevant to you.

The weekend after the Beds and Camcat we didn’t have much travelling to do, and no shows – just the Scottish AGM on the Sunday (1st May). The week after that, however, was the London Pet show, and the one after that the Nor’East and the Ocicat seminar, all of which I have talked about above. That brings us up to two weekends ago (the weekend of the GCCF Centenary Dinner), and the weekend before last (the Durham show), both of which I have talked about below!

GCCF Centenary Dinner

This fantastic event was held at the Belfry hotel near Birmingham on the evening of the 21st May, which was the night of the Suffolk and Norfolk (and Bombay and Asian Self) show at Wood Green. We took Elisabeth down, and had arranged to meet Valerie Sheldrake at Wood Green to collect some more old catalogues, but decided to visit Shirley, Kili and Monty on the way there.

Monty has been living with Shirley since the weekend of the AGCS show in January, because she wanted Kili to experience owning a pet. She and Kili have become really attached to him, and have asked to keep him, which we weren’t sure about until we saw him there. This was the first time we had visited Shirley since we dropped Monty off in January, and it was lovely to see him looking so settled. The bond between him and Kili is obvious – he watches her every move, and even when he went through to the kitchen for some food, he kept dashing back to the livingroom door to check on her!

It is only having seen him so relaxed there, that I realised just how unsuited he actually was to living with us, where he was always slightly twitchy and wide-eyed because he’s not keen on other cats or men, both of which he had to live with here! Shirley’s is actually his dream-home – no men or other cats, so he can be centre of attention, and a little girl who is evidently his world. He was perfectly happy to see us, but his heart is now very obviously with Shirley and Kili, so it doesn’t seem fair to bring him back. At least he’s happy, which is the most important thing!

Durham County Show

Last Saturday’s Durham show was a spectacular success, when I had worried that it would be a complete flop! We took Fiona and Dàrna, as usual, but also Xaria, to ensure that she ‘keeps her paws in’ at shows ready to try for her second UK Grand certificate at the Supreme in November. We gave a lift to Elisabeth, who was taking two neutered boys bred by her, but owned by Karen Hettman – they are Xaria’s great-uncle Stan, and great-nephew Zach.

I was worried that Fi would shout again, which she did, but not nearly as badly as last time, and by the end of the day she had almost stopped completely, so it looks like it has been a hormonal adolescent ‘thing’. She won her 1st Open, BOB and also two 2nds and a 3rd in her side classes.

We didn’t expect Dàrna to win anything, because she is still looking a bit thin and lacking condition due to calling (we’ll need to take her to stud soon), but she gave us a pleasant surprise by winning the Grand and also her Best of Breed, as well as a 1st, 2nd and 3rd in her side classes.

Dàrna admiring her rosettes — Dàrna admiring her Best of Breed rosette - or giving it a good sniff, anyway!

Dàrna kissing up to the camera — Dàrna being adorable and trying to kiss the camera

Zach won his third and qualifying Premier certificate, making him the 15th titled cat Elisabeth has bred, and took two 1sts and a 3rd in his sides. Stan had an excellent day, winning the Imperial (his 2nd) and Grand Premier certificates, and 1st in all of his side classes – a ‘red card day’.

The star of the show for us, though, was Xaria, who won another Imperial certificate and Best of Breed, plus two 1sts in her side classes, then going on to take Best Foreign Neuter, and finally Overall Best Foreign. That’s the third time she’s been Best Foreign, and the 5th time she’s won the level below that. If that’s ‘keeping her paws in’ for the Supreme, she must be planning something big!

BIS judge admiring Xaria's coat — BIS judge, Val Kilby, admiring Xaria's coat

Xaria being judged for BIS — Checking Xaria's profile - doesn't she look adorable?!

Breeding Plans

I can hardly believe we’re back round to that time of year again – it seems no time at all since I was posting that Katie and Dàrna were with their first boyfriends. Looking back, I wrote that blog entry on the 11th of April last year – how time flies!

This year we took Katie across to Sarah Davidson’s, which wasn’t nearly as much of a wrench as last year, since it’s only about 40 minutes away. When we had collected Olive’s boys from Sarah in March, we met Sarah’s other cats, including her lovely spotted tabby Asian boy, Kagura Shogun (the cat in the middle image on the bottom row of photos on her Asian Page). He is a chocolate spotted tabby burmese pattern, with beautiful big eyes and really good size and weight, and carries non-agouti, dilute and the longhair gene.

Since Katie is a black silver shaded carrying non-silver and non-agouti, but probably not burmese pattern, chocolate, or dilute, we should have the same possible colour outcomes as last year – black silver shaded, black silver ticked, black smoke, black (golden/standard) shaded, black ticked and black. This year, the difference is that we should get a mixture of both shorthairs (Asians) and longhairs (Tiffanies), which will be a first for us, since last year’s matings were both Tiffanie to Tiffanie and could therefore only produce Tiffanies. Katie could of course turn out to be carrying other genes and then the kitten colours would be a complete surprise!

She has been very purry and cuddly for the past couple of weeks, and is now expanding by the day, so she is definitely pregnant. Her kittens will be due around the end of the first week in July – how exciting!

It is now almost 9 months since Kia had her miscarriage, and she has been in season almost continuously for several months, so was really needing to visit a boy. She therefore went in with a rather special boy just over three weeks ago, and does look like she is pregnant. She is also eating slightly more, and hasn’t come back into season either, so we’re keeping our fingers crossed. Since she miscarried last time, and the boy is rather special, I’m not going to say too much else about him until the kittens are safely here.

Dàrna has also been calling almost continuously, and is losing condition, so we can’t hold off mating her for too much longer. I am therefore planning to take her to stud later in the month, and we’ll just have to hope that none of the litters are too big, or we’re going to be overrun with kittens and struggling to find homes for them all! She will also be going to a very special boy, whom we met for the first time at the weekend just gone – he is absolutely gorgeous, and I can’t wait to see what they produce together.

Keep your fingers and toes crossed for some lovely babies, and some even lovelier homes for them!!

Farewell to B-B & Other News

B-B sadly had to be put to sleep due to a sudden illness last month, but his siblings are still doing well. We had a good day out at the Scottish show, and are starting to make plans for this year’s litters.

Farewell to B-B

The latter part of January was pretty horrendous, with B-B being very ill. Initially the vets thought he had FIP, so couldn’t give him any treatment. Then we had tests done, which came back negative, so they thought it must have been some sort of bacterial vasculitis, and began treatment. Unfortunately, by the time we started this, the vasculitis had already damaged his kidneys, so we had to have him put to sleep after they failed suddenly.

B-B aged 1 day	B-B aged 10 days
B-B aged 2 weeks	B-B aged 4 weeks

We were obviously still nervous about FIP, so have had the lab in Edinburgh conduct a necropsy on him. At present, we are still waiting for the results of the histopathology tests, but the internal examination found none of the granulomatous legions that characterise FIP, making it unlikely that this is what killed him. We should get the rest of the results next week.

B-B aged 4 weeks	B-B aged 6 weeks
B-B aged 8 weeks	B-B aged 9 weeks

I am absolutely devastated, and can’t believe our beautiful B-B is gone. He was the first of Dàrna’s partial-breach kittens, so I had to literally pull him into this world, and I stroked his little head as he left it again. He was an early favourite of ours, both because he was so stunning, and because he was the first of the litter to really have a definite personality. We named him weeks before any of the others, because he suited his name so well – he always was a little imp, right to the end. He used to sit on top of us at night, and purred constantly.

B-B at Christmas aged 10 weeks	B-B at Christmas aged 10 weeks
B-B aged 3 months	B-B aged 3 months

RIP wee man. We miss you.

The boys aged 3 months (B-B on the right)	The litter aged 3 months (B-B at the back)
B-B aged 15 weeks	B-B with three siblings aged 15 weeks

Scottish Show

We entered the Scottish show a couple of months ago, and I was booked to steward for John Trotter. Added to that, Lona had entered Tabh (who is now well settled in his new home), and Fiona had entered Alek in the pedigree pet section. A few weeks ago, we thought that we wouldn’t be able to attend the show due to B-B’s illness, but with B-B gone, we realised that there was no point moping around the house missing him. I was hoped that John wouldn’t have lots of chocolate Burmese, though, because that would have been too much.

We had Fiona in the kitten class, Xaria going for her 5th (and final) Imperial, and Ali entered in the regional final of the Royal Canin Stakes. The judges were again impressed with Fiona, saying that she was very Burmese in type, and she won Best of Breed. She then topped her day off by receiving a nomination for Best in Show – since each judge was only allowed to nominate one cat from the section, that’s pretty good going!

Fiona relaxing in her pen at the Scottish show 2011 — Fiona relaxing in her pen with her Best of Breed and 1st rosettes

Fiona playing with her Best in Show nomination card — Fiona playing with her Best In Show nomination card

Xaria did us proud by winning the Imperial, making her now officially Imperial Grand Premier!

Xaria examining her Imperial certificate at the Scottish show 2011 — Xaria examining her Imperial certificate

Xaria sitting with her rosettes and certificate — Xaria looking beautiful with her rosettes and certificate

Ali was third in the Royal Canin final,winning us £20, and also won the heat to qualify for next year’s final, giving us another £16, so he has once again more than paid for his own show entry. The moggies are good at that!

Ali in his pen with some of his rosettes — Ali in his pen

Tabh was his usual adorable self, taking the whole experience in his stride once again. As before, the judges said that he is an attractive boy, though not the best Tiffanie, type-wise, but has a fantastic temperament. The was Alek’s first show, and he was a bit nervous initially, and spent most of the day scowling grumpily. He did well, though, and looked absolutely gorgeous!

Alek lying in his show pen — Alek scowling in his pen, and looking beautiful

I had a good day stewarding for John, with some lovely cats to handle, including having Fiona and Tabh in one of the side classes. My favourite (apart from those two, of course!), was a lilac Burmese kitten, who had the lovely impish face and beautiful eye set – her ears are still a bit big at the moment, but hopefully she will grow into those as she gets older, in which case she’ll be a stunning adult. John was very pleasant, and at the end of the day, he signed my first official stewarding certificate – I have finally joined the stewarding scheme, after months of people saying I should!

Other News

Anita took Keela to a Felis Brittanica (FIFé) show at the end of January, and she won Best in Show! Not a bad show start for Dàrna’s first litter, to have two of the girls win Best in Show at their first outings. Wouldn’t it be lovely if that continued?!

Keela with her FB awards — Keela with her rosettes and cup

Katie and Kia are both calling almost constantly now, so I’m hoping to take the two of them to stud early next month, which would give us kittens around the middle of May. Hopefully we will finally get a chance to just enjoy a litter grow up and leave us without problems! Since we’ve had an issue with B-B being ill, I’m waiting for a couple of test results back on the girls first, before we take them, just to make sure there are no lurking problems that we could pass on to the studs.

Wish us luck!

Kitten Update Day 12 & Week 14

Dàrna’s kittens open their eyes, Lainni and Soolay are spayed and neutered, and the other adult girls all call. Also, Lainni gets ready to go to her new home.

Well, it took me a bit longer to find the time to do this update than I expected. I have been working late all week trying to complete a very important tender for work (potentially work at least £150k to our family business!). With the adult cats and two litters of kittens to look after on top of that, there just hasn’t been time to think, let alone update our blog. However, the tender is now in the post (deadline for arrival is noon on Monday), and one of the other Directors told me to “take the rest of the week off”. All 1 1/2 hours of it!

Anyway, since I last posted, Lainni and Soolay have been neutered, and the younger litter have all opened their eyes. One of the boys in that litter is being very slow about the whole thing, but his right eye was finally fully open yesterday, and his left eye is more than 3/4 open. The others all have fully open eyes, and are starting to look about. Now that she’s properly got the hang of what she is to do, Dàrna is proving to be a wonderful mum, and her kittens are all nice and plump, and sparky-clean!

Lainni and Soolay had their operation on Tuesday, and seemed so little when I was leaving them at the vets. Thankfully, both did really well, and by Tuesday evening were already pouncing on eachother (doing nothing for my nerves, I can tell you!). I don’t think Soolay has even noticed that anything is different – at that age they haven’t yet become proud of their ‘bits’, as they do later on, so he’s blissfully unaware of what has been done. The operation is also relatively minor, with no stitches required, and they heal almost immediately.

For the girls the operation is rather more significant, because it means major abdominal surgery, so Lainni has a nice set of (purple!) stitches up her tummy, like a little zip. We were worried that she might lick the wound and irritate it, but she’s been as good as gold. She is highly confused by its presence, though, and keeps propping herself up so that she can get a good look at the stitches, then sits gazing at them with a perplexed expression on her face. Bless her!

Tiffanie kitten showing her spay scar — Lainni lying on her back showing her purple 'zip'

Alek is doing well in his new home, and both his new human ‘sisters’ seem to have taken really well to him. He has continued being a really cuddly baby in his new home, and his new ‘mum’, Fiona, is thoroughly enjoying waking up with him purring and cuddling into her legs in the mornings! I am so thrilled that we managed to find him such a fantastic home – it makes parting with them so much less traumatic when you know they are going somewhere that they will be adored!

Speaking of which, Lainni is going to her new home on Sunday, and Lona (her new ‘mum’) is so excited that she says it’s “like Christmas”! We are driving up with Lainni to Inverness, because Lona lives all the way up near John O’ Groats, so Inverness is about half-way. I am gutted not to be able to take Lainni to her new home myself, to watch her settling in the way that we did with Alek, but with everything else that’s going on at the moment a 12-hour round-trip to the north of the country just isn’t sensible. Hopefully we can go and visit them in a few weeks once Lainni is settled in, but if not, at least we know we will be seeing her at shows in the future.

Soolay still doesn’t have a new home booked, which I can’t say I am altogether upset about, because he can ‘fill in’ until Dàrna’s litter are big enough to be playing and giving us cuddles! I must confess to being surprised that he’s the one who is left, because he is such a sturdy, strong-feeling kitten, and has the most adorable temperament. One minute he’s racing around the room like a nut-case, and the next minute he’s crashing into your lap for a cuddle, with huge purrs. I am sure the right home will arrive for him eventually, and in the meantime, we get to enjoy him for longer!

Breckin finally started calling the Friday before the Wyvern show, and then stayed in season for over a fortnight. The second week of her call, Katie came into season as well, so we had the two of them trying to out-shout eachother. They would roll around on the floor at either end of the hall-way, taking it in turns to shout, and getting louder every time. Thankfully, they both finished their calls at the weekend, but now Kia has started, and is really shouting. She keeps going out into the run and making the most awful racket (she does make the strangest noises) – I’m just hoping none of the neighbours hear it and complain!

Unfortunately, I’m not very sure what to do about mating Kia now, because there has been a bit of a misunderstanding relating to Mickey, who she went to last time. It turns out that the owners of his sire, and his dam’s sire (his grandsire) didn’t want any boys sold for breeding, but Rita hadn’t realised this when she sold him. At the moment it is looking like he will have to be returned to Rita, and she will probably have to neuter him, so the mating is very unlikely to be able to be repeated! We’ve now got to try and find a different boy to use, but with less time to arrange things. Oh joy!

I love showing, but I must confess to being quite glad that we have nothing on tomorrow, because it means that we can get caught up around the house, and also enjoy some last cuddles with Lainni. Other than taking Lainni to meet Lona, this is the first weekend in ages that we’ve not had something specific to be doing. After the amount of work that’s gone on this week, I am really looking forward to it!

Now if I can just persuade Richard to do the driving on Sunday…

Kitten Update Week 12 & Wyvern Show

The kittens are all back to being fully healthy, Dàrna is almost ready to give birth, and Xaria wins Best Foreign Neuter at the Wyvern show.

I can’t get over the fact that our ‘babies’ are now ready to have their second vaccinations! They will be having their vaccinations on Friday afternoon, which means that I will hopefully be able to have them in for their neutering operations the week after that. Alek and Lainni are still smaller than Soolay, but both are making good gains every day, and even Alek is now over 750g. Admittedly, that’s not a patch on Soolay’s 1.25kg, but at least he’s not actually half the size of his brother anymore!

Three Tiffanie kittens aged 12 weeks — The three kittens together

All three kittens have good appetites, and constantly have nice full tummies now, which is great to see. Whenever I take new food into their rooms they all run around my feet squealing as if they haven’t been fed for a year, and as soon as the food is put down they’ll have their little faces stuffed into it. I’ll have to clear away the previous batch of food to make room for the new stuff, but they always prefer whatever new food you’re putting down to whatever it is that they’ve got at the moment!

I thought we ought to put up another set of individual photos, but if I thought taking them was hard before, it was nothing on now. The only way to get them to look where you want them to is to wave a feather stick at them, but that results in them doing ‘owl eyes’. In the end we decided just to settle for the ridiculous round-eyed look but at least having the kittens looking at the camera!

Lainni from the front	Lainni from the side
Soolay from the front	Soolay from the side
Alek from the front	Alek from the side

The three all look quite different (within the bounds of a pedigree mating) – I think Lainni is the prettiest, Alek is the cutest and Soolay is really becoming quite handsome. He’s a big strapping boy, with a lovely rich colour, and a good soft coat. I am quite tempted to enter him in a show before he leaves us, just to hear what the judges think. He does have a bit of a habit of rounding his eyes (although they are gorgeous when he’s not doing that), and I suspect that his limbs will be a bit chunky to be ideal for the breed, but I still think he’s a very handsome boy!

Black Shaded Tiffanie kitten lying down at 12 weeks old — Soolay showing off his lovely colour

We’ve had the results of the kitten’s faecal panel back, and it turns out that their illness has essentially been caused by food poisoning. They tested positive for exposure to clostridium perfringens, which is the third most common cause of food poisoning in humans. It is something that occurs naturally in the guts of all vertebrates, but the kittens guts managed to get out of balance and the bacteria multiplied more than usual, causing them to become ill. Perhaps next time we ought to try giving them probiotics??

The Girls

Katie is now completely dry of milk, but Dàrna’s came in on Sunday. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was the kittens who discovered this, whilst cuddling up with her, so she had to be removed from them immediately. As it happens, our intention was always to move her up to the kittening room that day, but we were going to move her in the evening. Once the kittens had found the milk, however, I just scooped her up and took her straight up there, and she is now in there with Katie for company.

Although Dàrna’s due date is technically Thursday, we don’t think she’s actually going to go that long. She is huge, and the kittens are tightly packed, but in the past couple of days they have all started wriggling around to get in the right orientation for birthing. Dàrna’s ‘happy hormones’ also kicked in on Sunday, and she has been ridiculously purry since. She’s also become clingy, though, so if we’re not in the room then Katie has to be in there to keep her company. We would have liked to have kept the room with just Dàrna to be sure of minimising any infections, but she’s just not happy by herself, and we can’t be with her all the time, so limiting her company to just us and Katie will have to do.

Darna purring and paddling with her paws

Kia is still convinced that Katie’s kittens actually belong to her. Clearly her hormonal brain hasn’t computed the impossibility of a trio of 10-week-old kittens having been produced when she miscarried, because she chirrups at them as a Mother does to her babies. She is really good with them, playing very gently with Lainni and Alek, and then rolling around the floor with Soolay. She also makes sure that they are nicely ‘polished’ whenever she gets the chance. Katie would still allow her kittens to suckle if they were given access to her, so they are shut away whenever she is about and vice versa.

Wyvern Cat Club Show

We went down to Worcester for the Wyvern show on Saturday, staying over on the Friday night, in the same B&B as last year. Once again we had a lovely time, and Elisabeth was with us this time, so we all went out for a delicious meal together the night before. I can see this becoming a bit of an annual event!

We had taken Monty, Breckin and Xaria, all of whom took Best of Breed. Monty lost out in the Grand to two more mature cats, so we can’t complain about that. I think Breckin was robbed in her Grand class, but you pay your money and you take your chance, so what can we do. Xaria took another Reserve Imperial (her third to the same cat, but at least the other girl is made up now, so won’t be against her again – yay!), but went on to take Best Foreign Neuter, which was a great result.

Russian Blue winning at the Wyvern show — Xaria looking smug with her rosettes

Ocicat winning at the Wyvern show — Breckin tucked under her BOB rosette

Abyssinian winning at the Wyvern show — Monty showing off his warm colour beside his BOB rosette

The real excitement of the day, though, was Elisabeth’s little Yzzy (Xaria’s niece) winning her 3rd CC, making her a Champion, and Elisabeth’s 15th titled cat. Elisabeth also had Tasha (Xaria’s mum) and Ziva (Yzzy’s daughter, so Xaria’s great-niece), who each won their respective Best of Breed awards. That meant that on top of her excellent result with Yzzy, it was a Dushenka who took all three Russian Best of Breeds – Tasha for Adult, Yzzy for Kitten and Xaria for Neuter. Add to that Xaria’s Best of Variety win, and Elisabeth’s prefix really had a rather good day!

Kitten Update Day 47, Eastern Counties Show & Stud Collections

The kittens continue to do well, and now have names. We collect the girls from stud, and Monty wins his first Grand certificate.

I can’t believe our ‘babies’ are almost seven weeks old already! Since they were managing to jump out of the pen anyway, we took one of the sides out of it last weekend. This gave them full-time access to the whole kitten room, and it didn’t take Lainni long to find the heated bed in the corner, where she has taken up residence.

Since my last post, order has been restored, and Lainni is now back ahead of target at just over 700g. The boys are only a few grams apart at just over 650g, but both are still running a bit behind target. They are all coming on leaps and bounds, though, so hopefully they will soon catch up with their sister.

The week following Grandpa’s death was a bit of a rush to sort out everything that needs to be done to organise a funeral. We buried him on Thursday of last week, following a touching service that I think was a fitting tribute.

We had arranged to collect Dàrna at the Eastern Counties show, which Steve and Thomas were doing with their own cats. Since we were going to have to go all that way to the show anyway, we figured we might as well make the most of it and enter some of our lot!

Unfortunately, the Eastern Counties was on the same day as the Scottish Rex show, which I very much wanted to support. A few weeks ago we were at a barbecue at Elisabeth’s, and I was complaining about not being able to support the show. She offered to take the Devons, saying that she could go straight up on the train from her house to Bearsden. I phoned her the next morning just to check that she really meant that she was happy to take them, and that it wasn’t just the wine talking! Thankfully, she confirmed that she was still happy to do so once sober!

Richard and I left home early on Friday morning in order to get to Elisabeth’s for about 9am to drop off the Devons before she left for work. We set them up in her ‘small bedroom’, and hoped that their presence wouldn’t upset her cats too much! It is surprisingly nerve-racking allowing someone else to take one of your cats to a show, even when you have complete trust in that person’s ability to look after your cats.

We went straight from Elisabeth’s down to Naomi’s to collect Kia, getting to her house at about 3:30pm. Thomas phoned me on the way south to say that Dàrna had pinked up and was starting to gain a bit of weight. She was also eating more than she had previously been doing, finishing her own dish first and then stealing from Pippin’s!

When we got to Naomi’s Kia was still in season, but had been mated every day last week, so that has hopefully been enough! Stacie (Kia’s breeder) lives about 25 minutes from Naomi’s, so we called in with her to let her see Kia again. In theory we were calling in just for a quick visit, but that never happens when we go to Stacie’s, because we always get talking. I think we finally left Stacie’s at about 7:30pm, and headed down to Tracy and Gary’s, where we were staying on Friday evening.

As always, Kia took the whole thing in her stride, settling straight into Tracy and Gary’s, and ignoring the grumpy noises made by Monty and Xaria in response to her arrival. She prowled around the two rooms, making sure that she knew every corner, then jumped up to give Gary a cuddle.

On Saturday morning we left Kia in the house and headed up to the show hall, getting there just before 8am. We had taken Xaria (chasing her 2nd Imperial), Breckin (chasing her 2nd Grand) and Monty (chasing his 1st Grand). After getting them penned and breakfasted, we went out to the car with Thomas and collected Dàrna, who wasn’t exactly thrilled at having been taken away from her ‘boyfriend’. We ran her back to Tracy and Gary’s, where she settled down on the sofa growling at Kia and us to show her disgust!

We had lunch with Tracy and Gary, then headed back to the show hall. By the time we got there, the Open results were all up, and I checked those while Richard went to feed the cats. Neither Xaria nor Breckin had won their certificate, but both had managed to win Best of Breed, and I couldn’t be all that upset about Breckin not winner hers, since she lost to the daughter of the stud boy whose kittens Dàrna is hopefully carrying! Breckin’s sister Lani was also there, and she won her 2nd CC. Monty had really done us proud, and won his 1st Grand – with two Reserve Grands already, from the Double show last month, he is doing incredibly well for an Aby of just over 13 months.

After the show we went back to Tracy and Gary’s for tea, before heading home. We couldn’t stay away for a second night because we didn’t want to risk the Devons upsetting Elisabeth’s cats by being there for a second night. We got to Elisabeth’s at about 1:30am, and by the time we had a hot drink with her, got the Devon’s ready and then did the journey home, it was 3:30am, and we more or less fell into bed after checking on the kittens.

They are now extremely active and playful, running all over the kitten room. All three are able to climb the stairs onto the window-ledge, and their various scratching posts. They can also now jump up high enough to grab the edge of the mattress, then hauling themselves the last bit onto the top of the bed. That means that when we wake up in the morning it is normally to find a trio of kittens wrapped around our legs!

They are all on solid food now, and Katie has started leaving the kitten room for substantial periods of time. She was out of the room all night last night, and then ran into the room to check on them this morning. Even after having her away from them all night, though, not one of the kittens tried to suckle when she did come back into the room. She only stayed with them for about 20 minutes, before asking to be let out again, and didn’t return to them until about three hours ago.

As the kittens have become more active, I wanted to have something to call them other than ‘blue-toes’ and ‘orange’. If we didn’t come up with something fairly quickly, they were going to be known by their colours forever-more! I am not going to register the names we have chosen for a few more weeks to give us a chance to find new owners, so that they can have the option to change them. However, subject to such changes, the names will be An-Sùlair (‘The Gannet’, because he LOVES his food) for Orange, and Aileag (‘Hiccups’, because he seems to get them after every meal). Their pet names will be ‘Sùlai’ or ‘Soolay’, and Alek.

Lainni looking at the camera	Lainni side view
Sùlai front view	Sùlai side view
Alek front view	Alek side view

The more the kittens develop, the stronger their individual personalities and preferences become. Lainni tends to run over to us whenever we enter the room, and climbs onto our feet. She usually purrs when we start stroking her, although sometimes she is too hyper for that, and tends to pounce on our hands instead!

Tiffanie kitten biting fingers — Lainni biting my fingers

Sùlai will run up to us and give a little miaow if we talk to him whilst looking at him. He likes to tuck himself into our sides, and is a real softy. Alek, on the other hand, doesn’t really talk much, and is much more independent than the other two, but if we pick him up and lie him on his back, stroking his head, he goes completely limp and starts to drop off to sleep. Very cute! He is also going to be a fantastic hunter when older, because he responds immediately to any prey-type toy, whereas Lainni watches it for a while first, and Sùlai tends to run and hide!

Apologies for the epistle, but hopefully it won’t be so long until my next post, now that the family drama is over!

Lakeland Show & Kittens Imminent!

Another good day at the Lakeland Show, an enjoyable couple of days, and preparing for the imminent arrival of kittens.

The Lakeland & District Cat Club had their show in Kendal on Saturday, and we took Breckin, Xaria and Ali this year. Last year at that show, Tármus and Xaria both made up to Premier, and both that hall in particular, and Kendal in general, are lovely locations for a show, so we were hoping for an enjoyable day. This year, Xaria was looking for her first Imperial, and Breckin and Ali for Grands (Challenge and Mastercat).

As usual, we had packed the show case a few nights beforehand, so that we didn’t have a mad rush on the morning of the show. On Friday night, we also shut the three who were attending in the front hallway (with ‘facilities’), so that we knew we could find them in the morning. We had offered to take Xaria’s brother, Xander, in our car again, since he seems to do better when he’s travelled next to her, and this was to be his third (and qualifying) Grand, if he behaved well enough to win it. She was also glad to have one less basket to take, since she was also taking her stud boy, Teddy, one of her girls, Sophie (Xaria’s Grandmother), and one of her most recent litter of kittens, little Zach.

We had arranged to be at Elisabeth’s for 6am, so left the house about 5:15am, and had a good clear run through to Glasgow. We arrived a bit before 6am, and just in time to have a cup of tea! A good run South saw us arrive at the show hall just after 8am, which meant we were early enough to sail straight through vetting in: half an hour later, and there was a sizeable queue.

Breckin was a bit unsure to start with, because this is the first show we’ve had her at where we’ve not had Kia, Monty or one of the Tiffs to pop in the pen with her for the first half hour to help her settle. Margaret Rodger did say to me later, though, that she was absolutely fine when she was being judged (and that she’s gorgeous!), which is good to know! Ali was penned next to the gorgeous Agacat, owned by Steven & Stuart (Esanes Bengals, Pixiebobs & Maine Coons), who had taken Best Household Pet at the Nor’East a few weeks ago. We fully expected Aga to win, but losing is never a problem when you’re been beaten by something as gorgeous as him. As it happens, we were both beaten for the Grand Mastercat certificate by a ginger that we don’t know. Personally, I still think Aga should have got it!

The Sports Centre where the show takes place has a nice cafe upstairs, but it isn’t big enough to cope with the influx of exhibitors when the show ‘chucks out’, so we got up there just before 10am, to ensure we got seats (and bacon & sausage rolls!). We had managed to secure one of the window seats, which meant that I could watch Xander being judged (and Xaria, after that). Thankfully, Xander behaved impeccably, which meant that Elisabeth was able to come down from her panic station and actually enjoy the rest of the day! Xaria behaved beautifully, as always.

We then took advantage of our seats to mark up show catalogues, and also have another round of tea/coffee. By the time we finally went back down into the hall, Xander and Xaria’s results were up, and we were delighted to see that both had won their certificates. In fact, I checked Xander’s result first, and was so excited to see that he had won his Grand, that I forgot to check if Xazzle had won her Imperial! Elisabeth had been sidetracked by another of our friends, whose two Abyssinian boys had ‘done the double’ again, winning both the Imperial Grand Challenge and Imperial Grand Premier certificates. That meant I got to ‘break the news’ of Xander’s result to Elisabeth, which was quite a nice job, really! When we did look at Xaria’s result, we were delighted to see that she had also done us proud and won her first Imperial.

As already mentioned, Ali didn’t win the Grand Mastercat, nor did Breckin win her Grand. We didn’t actually expect Breckin to get it, though, because she is still so young, and the cat that did win it was the beautiful Freya, a Tiffanie girl owned by another friend, Sue Dykes (Kashi Tibetan Terriers). Freya is one of the most stunning examples of the breed that most people have ever seen, and is out of the stud that I had originally hoped to be able to use before we even got our first girl. Unfortunately, he is no longer working, so we just have to be content with seeing his gorgeous offspring at shows!

Once we were allowed back in to the cats, we did the rounds, telling them how clever they had been (all of them), and then gave them lunch. We then headed off for a leisurely walk in glorious sunshine, to find our own lunch. We couldn’t resist heading back to the same place as last year, the Natland MillBeck Ice-Cream Parlour. Needless to say, we all enjoyed ice-cream sundaes to finish!

When we returned to the show hall we went straight over to check the remaining results, and another of our friends came up to say that Elisabeth needed to go and check baby Zach’s pen. When we did so, we discovered that to top off the day, Zach had taken Best Foreign Kitten! The two Imp-winning Abys had also taken Best Foreign Neuter and Best Foreign Adult, so regardless of who took Overall Best Foreign, one of our friends had it! In the end, it was the stunning adult, Coen (Glendavan Roderick-Jaynes), who also made up to Imperial on the day.

Sunday was another lovely sunny day, and we spent the first half getting some of the garden back under control (two weekends where we were busy on the Saturday and then it rained on the Sunday, followed by last weekend at Kirsty’s meant it was needing the work!). The afternoon and evening were spent through at Elisabeth’s, where she was having her annual barbecue. Another delicious meal, helped along by Lenny Pontello’s barbecuing skills, and also a chance to meet some of Elisabeth’s family, as well as catch up with Lorraine and her baby, Lina.

This evening I have been out with my family to celebrate Kirsty’s and my birthdays. When the others decided to sing ‘Happy Birthday’, we discovered that the two names actually work quite well for joint celebrations – “Happy Birthday, Heather and Kirsty”! How we didn’t discover that years ago at our joint parties as kids, I don’t know.

Katie is really heavily pregnant now, and has become really proud of her tummy in the past 24 hours. She will roll onto her back to ask you to stroke it, which is something she’s never done before.

Katie's pregnant tummy

Before going out tonight, we noticed that Katie’s sides had relaxed off, which I’ve been told means that labour is starting, and she was being quite chatty today, so I think she’s going to go tonight. Her kittens are also being really active, although I didn’t manage to record their most active period because I was too busy watching it myself!

Katie's kittens moving around inside her

We filled her birthing box with towels before going out, just in case she decided to have her babies while we were eating, but she is still wandering around the bedroom happily now. In preparation, I’ve brought up the scales and a notepad and pen to record weights, and also a selection of nail-polishes to mark kitten toenails so that we can tell them apart. Wish us luck!

Cat TV

We’ve set up a TV for the kittens to watch, and also organised the next set of stud visits.

We finally got around to setting up a TV in the kitten room last night. The theory behind that is that it will get the kittens used to the sound of a TV, whilst also keeping the girls company when they’re in there alone. It also means that we can sit with them in the evenings and still keep up with CSI!

I’ve organised a repeat stud visit for Dàrna, and also a stud visit for Kia. Breckin still hasn’t called yet, which is no bad thing, because it means I don’t have to sort out a stud for her until later in the summer. If she held off until the early Autumn, that would be ideal, since it would avoid the potential of her due date clashing with The Supreme! Chance being what it is, though, who knows what will actually happen! Amanda (Colgan – Rushbrooke Asians, Burmese & Bengals) has always said that her mantra is “manage the situation”, and I can rapidly see us finding the same.

Just one pregnancy this month!

We’ve finally had to face up to the fact that Dàrna’s not going to be having any kittens this time around: Katie looks like she’s swallowed a beachball, but Dàrna’s as slim as ever. It is fairly common for maiden (first-time) queens not to take at their first mating, so we’ve actually been quite lucky that even Katie is pregnant. Although it is obviously disappointing that Dàrna hasn’t taken, at least we have Katie’s kittens to look forward to…

Introducing the Cagaran Cats

Who or what is Cagaran?

This is my first attempt at blogging about the cats, so I’m not sure how this will turn out! Apologies if it gets a bit wandered at times.

My name is Heather, and with my partner/boyfriend Richard, am the owner of the GCCF Prefix Cagaran, under which we will be breeding GCCF-registered pedigree Tiffanies, Ocicats and Ocicat Classics, plus potentially an occasional Asian Shorthair. We live near Falkirk, which is roughly in the middle of a triangle between Edinburgh, Glasgow and Stirling, in Central Scotland.

We have thirteen cats; eleven pedigrees and two moggies. They are introduced in the ‘Our Cats’ section of our website. Our first cat was a moggie, and we acquired our first pedigree in 2005. At that point, we had no intention of showing, and stumbled upon the world of shows almost by accident in 2008. Since then, we have become completely hooked, and have shown all of our cats on multiple occasions (including the moggies). They are all now titled except our original pedigree, Call (a Maine Coon), and our youngest cat, Monty (an Abyssinian), who only needs one more certificate to become a Premier!

Alongside becoming hooked on shows, we also discovered two/three breeds that we wanted to work with ourselves – the Tiffanie (semi-longhaired member of the Asian Group), and the Ocicat/Ocicat Classic. We have four ‘entire’ (un-neutered) girls: two Tiffanies, one Ocicat and one Ocicat Classic, and will hopefully be having our first litters from them this year.

I am beginning this blog, just before we take our first couple of girls down to stud, and it will hopefully track us through our first steps as breeders.