Pardalis Ocicats

Lexi and Uno have now both achieved 4 merits each to help move the Ocicat Classic breed recognition on to the next stage.  Uno got the final one needed at the Suffolk and Norfolk Cat Club show yesterday.

A total of six cats have now gained the required number of merits for us to complete the preliminary stage and put in the application for the next and final stage.  The next stage will take longer as more Ocicat Classics and breeders will need to be involved, but the commitment is there and hopefully it won’t be too long before this beautiful breed can be shown on equal footing alongside their Ocicat siblings.

I was woken at 1am on Friday morning by a rustle coming from the litter tray.  I rolled over thinking ‘hope it’s not a smelly one’.  Then I heard a squeek.  I jumped out of bed and looked in all the obvious places that I’d prepared to give Fizz a choice of where to give birth.  The nice cosy cardboard box by my bed,  the Sturdi where the kittens and mum usually spend their first 3 weeks until they get too active and are ready to come downstairs, and the kneehole in the dressing table.  But no, madam had decided the covered litter tray was the place to be!

I lifted Fizz and a wet kitten out and transferred them both to the cardboard box.  The poor little mite had bits of litter all stuck to her!  Luckily it was clean litter :-)  I brushed off what I could while Fizz had her second kitten in the comfort of the box.  A total of 5 were born by 2.30am.  All good weights, not much difference between them all.

They’re all putting weight on nicely and finding their lungs!  Fizz is a great mum, she’s only left them to stretch her legs a few times and she covers them with the blanket when she’s gone.  We’ve got a black silver and a lilac (maybe lilac silver) boys and chocolate, blue and blue silver girls.  It’s lovely to have them all different and such a nice variety of colours.  Well done Fizz!

Fizz is looking swell!  We’re expecting her happy event by the end of the week.  Difficult to tell if she’s bigger than last time.  I think she is, though that could be down to it being her second pregnancy rather than there being more kittens.

It was very warm during this stage of her pregnancy last time and she was sleeping a lot.  This time she’s far more fidgety and awake, really quite restless.  I think we’ll both be glad when the kittens have arrived and we can all get some sleep

Fizz went to stud a few weeks ago and we can safely say it was a successful visit and we’re expecting to hear the pitter patter of tiny paws in about 6 weeks time.  This time she went to a beautiful Blue Silver -  Grand Champion Thickthorn Cus Cus giving us the possibility of Black silver or Chocolate silver kittens.  We’re really looking forward to having kittens around again!

Lexi’s daughter has been shown at a few cat shows now and is maturing into a little champion!  Yesterday she was entered into the Coventry and Leicester show and won her open class, getting best of breed too, and came first in all 4 of her miscellaneous classes!  Well done Florence! Following in grandma’s footsteps - Imperial Grand Champion Thickthorn Meadowsaffron.

Our third showing of Lexi to get another merit brought us to Maidenhead last Saturday.  Only three cats in the Assessment this time but our beautiful girl walked off with the Best Assessment Exhibit earning her a large bag of food and a helium balloon to play with and us £20 and a bottle of bubbly - very nice! Her side classes were a good size and she got thirds in each of them, so we were very happy with that.

Saturday saw us heading down to Reading for the Southern Counties Cat Show to try and get Lexi her 2nd merit.  Not only did she get it with a glowing report from the judge, she won 1st, 2nd and 3rd places in her three side classes.

Lexi’s mum, Thickthorn Meadowsaffron, won her Imperial Grand Champion Class, the first entire Ocicat to win that accolade - well done Saffi!

Saturday was an important day for the Ocicat Classic.  It was the first show in which the new breed could be entered.  We took Lexi and Uno along and they, together with Ameeka’s Thickthorn Calypso (Jazzy, the first Classic to be registered for breeding) gained their first merit certificates with glowing judges reports.

Lexi seemed a bit put out not to have her usual double-sized exhibition pen with the nice curtains to hide behind.  She’d only been in her pen for a minute when she decided to squeeze under the water dish that we’d hung on the side and tip it all over her back and bedding!  Then, later, when we’d put food down for them after the judging, Uno decided to bury his lunch with the cat litter.  He has a habit of scratching the floor around his food, to hide and save a bit for later.  Normally the cat litter is on the other side of the room at home though and he looked a bit flummoxed when he’d actually been successful in burying it! He looked at us as if to say, ‘how do I eat that now?’ So, they’d both managed to make a nice mess of their pens

We need six individual Ocicat Classics to each gain four merits before we can go on to the next stage and then finally attain championship status.  We also entered Foreign breed side classes and Uno got two seconds and a first, as did Jazzy.  Lexi got a second, third and fifth.  They were big classes though! It was a fantastic start to the breed’s showing career and the judges all seemed very impressed with the beautiful tabby pattern on the sleek, muscular Ocicat, saying what a lovely combination it was and how good it was to finally see them on the show bench.  Onwards and upwards!

The GCCF has granted Preliminary Recognition to the Ocicat Classic breed with immediate effect, at the Council meeting on 29th October 2008. This means we can now show our beautiful Lexi instead of just putting her on exhibition.  The first show we’re eligible to enter is The Shorthair cat Society on the 10th January 2009, which luckily is little over an hour from here, so a nice one to get to.  We’re hoping there’ll be lots of Classics there, including Lexi’s very handsome sons Ossie (Pardalis Kanati, now owned by Gill Toosey) and our own Uno.

Last Saturday saw the 3rd annual Ocicat Championship Show. This year it was twinned with the Tabby Cat Club in a lovely hall in beautiful Alcester, Warwickshire. We took Lexi on exhibition and put her son, Uno, in with her for company. They both spent most of the time hiding behind the curtain!  We also took our moggy, Kolo, for his first ever show at the grand old age of 5 or 6 (we’re never sure as he was a rescue cat).  He wasn’t impressed at being kept in the night before so we could ensure he’d be around when we wanted to leave at some silly hour soon after dawn. He settled in his pen without any complaint when we got there but refused to eat or use the litter tray in protest!  We’ve always known he’s a gorgeous looking cat with a rich coloured coat and beautiful temperament, now we know the judges agree with us :-)) He won all his classes and got the ultimate accolade of Best Household Pet.  As soon as he was transferred to his plush winner’s pen with it’s black interior and gold curtains he looked very smug and much more comfortable!

Also at their first shows were three of Lexi’s other kittens.  Lorraine and her family brought Florence (Pardalis Genesis), a beautiful chocolate kitten, and Gillian brought Ossie (Pardalis Kanati) a very handsome Classic patterned boy, and very cute Selu (Pardalis Selu). It was lovely for us to have our prefix represented for the first time and we’re very grateful to Lorraine and Gillian for taking the time (not to mention the expense!) to bring them to show. They all did really well, with Florence winning her Open Class and Best of Breed and 2 of her 3 side classes, then going on to earn the title of Best Female Kitten and her place on winner’s row.  Selu was just pipped to the post in the Open by her sister but gained 1st, 2nds and 3rds in her side classes. Ossie was in the new Ocipet classes as, being a Classic, he can’t be shown with the spotted Ocicats. We should hear this month whether the separate breed of Ocicat Classic has been accepted and can be shown in its own right in preliminary classes very soon.  Ossie won all his classes and had his pride of place next to Kolo’s pen also on winner’s row as Best Overall Exhibit.  All in all a very successful day!!