HIMALAYAN HIGHLIGHTS Ben and Ann Borrett (Of Chestermere)
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Chestermere Cajun of Sa-Bon 0: Sam & Bonnie Myers Gr. Ch. Dunbrody's Sneak Preview B-0: Dick Rhodes 452 C.F.A. HIMALAYAN HIGHLIGHTS Ben and Ann Borrett (of Chestermere) Ann Ben Perhaps first of all we should clarify the fact that a Longhair is not classified by type. A Longhair does not necessarily mean a Per- sian. Therefore those who make statements about the "Longhairs-or- Persians" in one breath, as if they were one and the same, are not accurate ; Longhairs are just that, cats with Long hair. Possibly the most numerous of the Longhair Breeds is our lovely Persian, in all its many beautiful colors. There is the Himalayan Breed of Longhair, and we hear talk of the revival of the earlier Angora Breed of Longhair (CFA. YB 1970). Then we have the Sacred Cat of Burma or Birman, a breed of Longhair, and the Balinese is yet another. The Maine Coon Cat is a Longhair Breed, as is the Turkish Cat, and there was the Longhair Russian Blue of yesteryear (CFA YB. 1967). It is not unreasonable to suppose that many of our present shorthair breeds and colors of cat, may, if the interest occurs, be bred to produce long fur. Indeed, already the Longhaired Manx and the Longhaired Abyssinians are not uncommon, and it could be only a matter of time before many more different types of Longhair cats are produced in sufficient numbers to warrant recognition for competi- tion in Championship Shows. No amount of contradicting can alter the above facts — there is no such thing as the "Longhair Type," for each is different in some way. There used to be a saying in England that the Siamese was so royal and haughty that it would never breed with any other cat. We all know today that this is not true, the Siamese has been crossed with many other breeds, particularly with regard to obtaining new "points" Year Book, 1971 453 color, and we know that the resultant offspring of a Siamese mated with any other variety cat, will never have the coat pattern of the Siamese unless the mate used is also carrying the Siamese coat pattern as well, which could have been the reason for the birth of the above saying. The offspring will carry the Siamese color characteristic, cap- able of being passed on to future geenrations only when this factor meets with a similar factor in the opposite sex. In 1924 it was acknowledged that the inheritance of the Siamese coat color was not well understood and statements were made in Eng- land to the effect that the evidence of Longhair being recessive was not really conclusive. In 1930 Dr. Clyde Keeler and Mrs. Virginia Cobb of USA experimented to produce the first recorded Siamese marked cat with long fur (Journal of Heredity 1933). They wished to prove that such a cat could be produced and they succeeded. Pre-1939 the late Brian Stirling-Webb of England told us he corresponded with Mrs. Cobb and worked on the same lines to produce a cat of Persian type with long fur and the Siamese coat pattern, and he wished to produce enough to start a new breed. With the war and food ration- ing, only limited breedings were possible. In the early 1950's the late Mrs. Marguerita Goforth worked on her lines in California, and we worked on ours in Canada. We had some pleasant correspondence with each of these breeders — our aims were all the same. It was the cat fanciers and their elected representatives who divided cats into categories to facilitate judging at cat shows, and provide some semblance of organization for future breeding. In U.K. the cat fanciers divided cats into Longhair and Shorthair. Then they sub-divi- ded these into what they called Breeds. For example, No. 1, Black Longhair breed. No. 2, Blue-Eyed Longhair breed: No. 2a, Orange- Eyed White Longhair Breed. No. 9, Red Tabby Longhair Breed. No. 13b, Birman Longhair Breed, and so on. They had to use a, b, c, etc., because they had only allowed Nos. 1 to 13 for Longhair Breeds ; No. 14 onwards was for Shorthaired cats. In North America the cat fanciers divided cats into a number of breeds to start with. Abyssinian, Burmese, Persian, Siamese, and so on. Then they sub-divided these breeds into colors. The number of breeds and colors could be increased as necessary. When the Governing Council of the Cat Fancy of England in 1955 accepted the Himalayan for Championship competition, they voted to call them Colourpoint Longhairs, Breed No. 13b, and they are still listed and registered as a separate breed in the GCCF Application for Registration forms and in the 1971 Cat Lover's Journal, Year Book of the British Cat World, which lists the English Pedigree Cat Breed Numbers in full on page 102. Through our Siamese, we knew of Bryan's experiments and decided to visit and purchase some of these new cats. In our early Himalayan pedigrees, with the Briarry prefix we have the most astonishing crosses — SH Blues, SH Blacks, Siamese, Burmese, a SH White, LH Blues, Blacks and Smokes of course, a SH Cream, SH Tortoiseshell, Chestnut Brown SH and others. It appears that any registered cat 454 C.F.A. (long or shorthair) can be bred indiscriminately if so desired, and the result registered in England as "what it looks like." However on this side of the Atlantic, the Association rules were very rigid as to which could be crossed with what. One Association did allow the showing in championship classes of such crosses, if a breed was recognised, and it could be shown as "listed". In 1957 we were asked to draw up a proposed Standard by this Association. We did, it was accepted and is still the same as when we wrote it. Saying Seal Point Colorpoint Longhair is very cumbersome and there are other animals with the same color restricted-to-points pat- tern known as Himalayan. This name was considered apt and com- pact. There was a vote of the then interested breeders and the name Himalayan adopted on this side of the Atlantic. In other Associations, other breeders started the move for Himalayan recognition for Cham- pionship status, and this was accomplished within a year or two. The conformation and bone structure of the Balinese in the CFA Show Standard Book, as compiled by Irene Powell, follows word for word the Siamese standard, yet we have heard no mention of the Balinese being classed as a Siamese — it is rightly a separate breed. Yet every now and then a voice crops up about the conformation and bone structure of the Himalayan being like the Persian, and thus it should be a Persian. This obviously shows lack of knowledge of the basic facts of how the cats were divided for Judging in the first place. As pointed out so aptly, by our dear friend, the late Mr. Robert Winn, under the existing way of grouping all cats for show in North America, the crossing of two different breeds of cat, could never be called a color class of either. Hybrid, as defined by Webster, is an animal or plant produced by interbreeding different varieties — mixed — derived from different sources. Thus the Himalayan is a hybrid, for it doesn't matter how many generations are bred, part of it comes from the Persian and part from the Siamese. Such an animal can be produced accidentally if there are free-roaming Persians and Siamese together, or it can be man-made. Some hybrids breed true, some don't, and some are sterile. Calling the Himalayan a hybrid does not mean it will not breed true, it merely admits that it comes from two different sources. New varieties, formed from two other varieties are always termed hybrids, and it is not a derogatory term, indeed hybrids are often acknowledged to be better than the originals. And this was the idea with the purposeful production of the Himalayan in the first place, to combine the desired qualities of the Persian with those of the Siamese. So in North America as well as in England, the Himalayan became a separate breed, for since the Him- alayan was originally produced from two already recognised breeds, the end product could not be any more Persian than Siamese. If the resultant 50% Persian 50% Siamese first cross is mated to a Per- sian, and the resultant offspring again mated to a Persian. and so on, it will decrease the amount of Siamese influencing its make-up at each cross — and one will eventually end up with a solid color cat Year Book, 1971 455 again. The points will start to fuse into the body color and the eye color will revert to the original Persian. Whatever makes some people think that the only characteristic that they want will be retained, is a mystery. Genetics is not an exact science — you can breed for what you want, but it doesn't mean you are going to get it, for you cannot use a pair of scissors on a chromosome to cut out what you want and what you do not want. They wind around each other so much at concep- tion, then double themselves, and when cell division occurs, each set pulls apart to opposite ends and forms a new cell, with the same number of "characteristics" the original cell had. If this process were identical each time, every animal (or plant) with the same character- istics (or genes) involved in its make-up, would be identical.