The continuing saga of a new breeder....

I leave tomorrow at 5:30am to go to a TICA show in Victoria, BC. My show kitten still has a bare patch on her throat from an infected scratch but it's all healed up. I am not sure if I will place her in any rings, will talk to people when I get there. Since I was entered in the show anyway, I had made arrangements for a couple to pick up Right-spot kitten as their new Mau pet. Right-spot was my pick for a show kitten, but she developed a tiny kink at the end of her tail. A judge in PA said that she was an extremely nice kitten and that it was a shame she would have to be petted out. I am very happy about her new home though. She will be an only kitty in a brand new condo with two young owners who recently lost their Abyssinian.

I expect I'll be sad when I say goodbye as Right-spot has always been our favourite. No-spot (my show kitten, Safiya) is super sweet however, and we are loving her just as much and are happy to be keeping her. She has a fabric catnip-filled triangle that I picked up in PA that she carries around everywhere. None of the other cats are allowed to play with it.

Finally, Skylark has been in heat on and off for the last few weeks. Our plan was to let her rest after her litter and breed her in the Fall. Apparently that wasn't her plan though. She scooted down to the basement when my boyfriend was doing laundry and it shouldn't have been a problem since the boys can't get out of their enclosure. Skylark went onto the roof of it and went through however.. and no-one knew for at least three hours. I called my vet and was told that while it wasn't the best scenario, it shouldn't hurt her to have another litter. So we are watching her to see if she caught - she would be due in late August... I only have one intact male, Tsekani, and we are very happy with the results of their first mating so it's going to be OK.

She should be fine having another litter. Most Oci's are mated back to back as they call a lot. Once the kittens are around 14-16 weeks, they are often mated again having 2 litters a year. If left to long their condition deteriorates from calling themselves silly.

Well. That wasn't a great weekend. The show was nice, and I met a lot of great people. I recognized some of my friends from past shows and talked to them a bit. My kitten was pretty good, she looked kind of icky with her missing throat fur, but the judges said it was OK. Since she was the only Mau there, they wanted to have her in the rings to demonstrate the Mau breed. She didn't final in any rings though )=

Judging four of the eight rings took until 2pm, and Safiya was getting pretty pissy. She was hissing at cats I walked her past on the way to the rings and she was crouched a bit on the judging table. She didn't offer to hiss or hurt the judges, but they didn't like her all that much I guess. There were 8 rings total, with 4 judges so after 5 rings I decided to absent her from the final three. The first four were all breed, and the final four (under the same judges) were long hair/short hair specialties, and there weren't all that many cats there. So I was surprised that she didn't get a top 5 out of 13 shorthairs in the one specialty ring she was went into. Maybe one of the final three specialties she would have gotten a top 5, but we were both very tired and just wanted to go home. I could have kept her in for the second day as well.

Mostly I wanted to get her out to a show and see how she reacted. It was a TICA show, and I am not planning to specialize in TICA since I can't afford to get to that many TICA shows if I am working on CFA shows. There was a Savannah at the show and a lot of Bengals. No Cornish Rexes, but 14 Devon Rexes.

What was interesting is that my cage was the most popular one at the show. I had the two Mau girls in there, and spectators just loved them. Some people came back five times just to look at them. I got about 6 contact information requests from people interested in kittens someday but I forgot to make up business cards. Definitely want to have a Mau history sheet made up and a batch of cards for next time.

Before I left, I went and bought a small suitcase on wheels and I packed all my cat show gear in there. I have some pretty lame show curtains but they do the job. It was much easier for me to set-up this time with the suitcase of everything I need. Learning as I go I guess. The show stuff will stay in the suitcase and is neatly stored away.

I am rambling, I know, but this is my sort of journaling exercise. The young couple who bought Right-spot showed up and took her away, after signing the contract and listening to my care spiel. They seem really nice and WAY too young to be buying a condo already. I'm just getting old I think, all people in their 20's look like children to me now.

So - My mentors assure me that my kitten is grandable in CFA. She is not the best of the litter, but she is really nice. One of my mentors is a judge in CFA, so they do know what they are talking about. I have to admit that I was quite disappointed in her results. I wonder if, since there are seriously no Maus in this area, the judges are hesitant to final a Mau. Would they not final a Mau because of the missing neck fur? Since she is just 4 months and the rest of the kittens she was up against were pushing the 8 month mark, do they just look better? Does TICA look for different things in a Mau than CFA?

At the end of the day, I had decided to not bother taking her to any more shows until she can compete as an adult cat. I know cat showing is expensive, but I am in a situation where the costs are enormous and the closest CFA shows are 245 miles plus a $150 ferry to get to. It's probably better for me to save up my money to get to some good shows as an adult contender.

The funny thing is, I love cat shows. Despite all my complaining. Just getting out some frustration I guess, since none of my close friends/family/boyfriend know anything about showing and aren't all that interested in talking to me about it.

Each show is different. There could be a number of reasons she didn't final (most of what you mentioned). To tell you the truth, I have better luck showing males then females.

You have to keep her out there in front of the judges as much as you can (afford). And even if you had no cards, you could have had a "list" for people to sign for kittens. I did that for awhile before I had my cards.

Next time you will bring home a few rosettes.

Jack has his first adult show (alter classes) in August (ACFA) and then first CFA adult show in September.

Yes, I did have a card out and a few people took pictures of it. I also took a list of emails, and I have already emailed them my web address and such. Just thought it would be more professional of me to have business cards. I'm not in the hobby to sell kittens, since I am breeding for myself. But it's nice to have good homes available for the kittens that aren't show quality or I have no room for in my program.

Its funny you mentioned the boy/girl thing. I was watching the finals rings and since the number cards are gender coloured, it was very obvious that most of the cards the clerk put up were blue and very few were pink.

Forgot to mention that my vehicle was broken into on Sunday night and $600 of the money I got for Right-spot was stolen. We had unloaded the truck from a Costco trip and I forgot my purse on the seat. My own fault, but it still sucks.

There was a Mau at the last CFA show I went to.
I have not seen that many at the shows here.
Sorry someone broke into your car.
I am going to show Cleo in TICA in October and have no idea how she will do there.
Did you get any pictures from the show?

I forgot my camera. I really should get some good shots of my cats for my webpage though. Maybe I can make it to a show with a professional photographer in attendance.

That would be nice.
I should have got Cleos pictures done at the first show she went to.

You must remember too that just because there is one of a solitary breed it doesn't mean you will make a final. It sucks she didn't get placed but I take into account cats that are missing bits of fur/have a knot/have staining etc. It's nit picking however and it should only really count when there are two of equal type and you need something to fault. So sorry about the money too.

Thank you for sharing your story!

You are welcome. I recently finished my education and I think, crazily, that I miss writing. Maybe I should start a blog (=

A blog would be good.

Actually, putting a blog on your website or using a free blog and constantly linking to your website is a good way to help your search engine rankings. Plus, it's fun.

So sorry about the robbery. That's majorly crappy. Being robbed would probably make more more unhappy than the cat show results, since there are so many other shows... I hope everything works out for you and your babies.