Definition of "purebred"

The only one who has papers in my house is Bugsy - he is in fact a "proven" purebred.... He is also the one with the most health problems, and per my vet, resulting of inbreeding. Now I am all for mixes, unless you are going to show or breed.
I was told Lucky was a purebred, but she has no papers, so there is no proof. She is a total Ragdoll too, that's for sure.
It does sadden me when I see people putting the "purebred" as the cats first name - "my purbred blabla bla"... Or my "mixed breed bla bla"...
There are instances however, that it needs to be noted that the cat is a purebred - for example, my vet believing that all Bugsy's problems might be due to a poor immune system that came through from inbreeding. He also said weak immune system and immune problems are much more common in purebreds, because of the smaller gene pool, and that the worst thing one can do (as far as animal goes), is to be a "bad" breeder - the consequences are awful.
Do I think it makes a difference in the "value" of the cat? No. Do I think it is important to note, especially when medical problems arise? Absolutely.

Many many many shelters do not & will not give out the registration papers to the adopters. When we get registration papers with surrendered pets - they do not go to the new owners, as they do contain the previous owner's information (privacy issues). I know of one shelter who throws away registration papers when the pet is surrendered.

I agree that a cat has to have papers to be officially called a purebred. However, I don't think everyone who says s/he has a purebred cat is doing so for selfish reasons. Many are simply ignorant of the definition.

Many people and shelters kinda "assume" purebred if it looks like one. This is common with Persians, Siamese, Maine Coons, Ragdolls. If it looks close to this "breed" - people think its a purebred cat.

I've seen a lot of pointed long and short hair cats and those that are pointed/white that are called Siamese, Regdoll, Himalayan, or Snowshoe and willing to bet maybe 1% could be true - the rest is look alikes.

That's why I usually look at the cat and say "well it COULD have that breed in the background, but its really a domestic long (or short) hair cat" since you don't have papers to prove otherwise.

I have 3 purebred kitties.... Purebred Cutiepies!!!! It’s a new breed of cat LOL.

Actually my tuxies are just your average household cat and I have been told my Bugsy is half Turkish Angora. I never say that to people though. I find it weird that with dogs it is customary to tell people your dogs breed (Bruno is also part of the purebred cutiepie breed!) but with cats no one mentions it.

Question: Do you think that’s why people respect dogs more then cats? Because dogs are always some type of breed, but cats are always just cats unless you paid a lot of moolah for them? Because cats are "nothing" it’s easier to them of them as being nothing?

I am proud of all my mutts. As I said, they are worth more then any purebred to me .

I have one unpapered purebred.
She was the result of a BYB oops between littermates (Though I doubt it was an actual oops).
She is without papers because she was brought in to my vet clinic to be put down because her 'breeder' refused to work with her food allergies and said it just wasn't worth it in the long run (how could she make a buck on a runty, malnourished, sickly kitten?).
The receptionist at the clinic was a friend of mine and she talked her into releasing the kitten instead, the 'breeder' told her she could have the baby's papers for $50
I just happened to be bringing my boy in for his annual checkup and she told me about this baby and I adopted her immediately

If you have the papers, you could track down if he's inbred.

To me a purebred is one who has papers from a recognised governing association, GCCF, TICA etc.

I agree, and with cats it's much harder to tell than with dogs. I had a pure chocolate minature poodle once. He was given to me and came without papers, but you could tell by looking that he was a pure breed. The fact that he had no papers didn't matter to me. Unfortunately I was young and ignorant about dog raising then, and we eventually surrendered him because he was over aggressive, would not stay in the yard (climbed over 6 ft. wood fence) and bit the mailman twice. It was our fault. First of all, we should have had him neutered, and we didn't, and secondly we should have spent time training him or sending him to obedience school, and we didn't.

But the person at the shelter said he would be picked up by someone who wanted him as a stud. We hope that is what happened.

I hope he wasn't. If he's not papered he shouldn't be used for breeding.

Anything is better than having him put down. But that was years and years ago, so may he RIP.

Actually on one of his outings he did get into the yard of a neighbor who had a chocolate minature female and impregnated her when she was in heat. That neighbor wasn't too happy with us or our dog when it happened, but she had a litter of 6 chocolate puppies that she sold for $50 each (in 1972) and she offered us pick of the litter. We said no thanks! She wasn't unhappy with the outcome.

So they were born in the US and Kizzy and NN's parents are registered (TICA or CFA) ragdoll cats?

I think purebred is more than just papers. Papers can be made-up and are sometimes very questionable, as we have seen even on here many times, documents can easily be false. It depends on what type of papers and for how many generations and the breeding programs honesty and ethics. But in general, in the US, purebred to me means from a valid and real registry for generations from both sides of the pedigree (parents, same "real" registries). People look at a cat and deem it purebred in a shelter or rescue, when in fact it may or may not be at all, but if it makes the pet owner happier and a cat get adopted faster, then I don't see what the harm is as long as they aren't breeding them.

Hopefully not, if so, I am sure the shelters workers have more and more of this single dog's offspring in and out of the shelter system, for years to come Esp. with his behavioural issues, unstable nerves, etc. that he will pass down to future generations. Very sad cycle all around.

It wasn't the dog's fault. It was our fault for being young and irresponsible about training him properly. It is all conjecture since we will never know what happened to him. Will it make you feel better if I say I hope he was adopted and neutered? It just would have made me sad if he had been put down because he was a beautiful animal, and like most poodles, he was extremely smart and intuitive.

There are no "purebred" cats; just pedigreed cats! Purebred is a term used by the dog fancy and it does not effectively transfer to the cat fancy. The dog fancy has much larger numbers and has been established for a much longer period of time. They can claim purity. Within our pedigreed breeds we have hybrid breeds, natural breeds, and established breeds. No pure breeds.

This was Lucky's case when she was rescued.

The neat thing about cats is that there's very little variance in outline, no matter what the breed. Relatively speaking of course (purebred owners, don't shoot me for it! )! But in general for the MOST part cats have pricked ears, a long body, similar proportions, a long tail and weigh around 8 pounds. You know what I mean? As opposed to dogs who, not only among their pure breeds, but especially among their random bred mutts range VASTLY in type! If you think of a purebred animal as an animal that breeds true to type (without getting real specific), "the cat" in general sort of fits; to THAT definition that is. If you like cats you probably like all cats; if like you dogs, you might have an aversion to certain breeds that are completely different than the type you like (whether in appearance or temperament). I have purebred dogs because I love a certain breed; I dabble in another breed from the same group because it is somewhat similar in appearance and temperament (another bird dog); I can be happy with a random bred cat because it is easy to satisfy me aesthetically and personality wise b/c most cats fit my image of "cat"! Just something I was thinking about that I thought I would add to the thread. I will add that I don't see anything sad about prefacing my cat's description with purebred or mixed (?); it is merely a semantic description. Kind of like (and this does irritate me, but not make me sad, LOL!) when people describe their dog as a "yellow" Labrador or a "black" Lab....just call it a Labrador....so they come in different colors, it's not like each color is a separate breed Okay, now I'm rambling. LOL!

I would determine if a cat's a purebred only if you know it's lineage. Like someone else said, papers can be made up (just go to a puppy-mill pet store, they sure as he** aren't always purebreds but yet they manage to come up with papers a lot of the time). And you have to be able to see the parents- plus it takes someone with a trained eye for these things. Like I would never be able to tell for sure, since I really never cared about that. I did once have a foster that I'm sure was a purebred persian, but with no papers. I mean, his nose was almost sitting above his eyes! he was a cutie, but such a dork . He also had the most little health issues I've ever had in a cat, which to me was another indicator. Then again, I may be wrong cuz I didn't know his parents or his bloodlines

And honestly, I think that unless you are in the business of responsibly breeding them, like a lot of breeders on this site, it doesn't really matter if it's the purest of purebreds. I look for attitude and personality- I let the cat choose me, no matter what the breed/type/age. I call my 3 "purebred lovers" - that matters the most to me. (haha not that type of "lover ", u guys know what I mean)

In cats, you can outcross to other breeds depending on the type of breed you have. Tonkinese were created from Burmese and Siamese cats. Ocicats were created from Siamese, American Shorthairs, and Abys. While both of these breeds no longer cross to their parent breeds, they are hybrid breeds and technically not pure. Many breeds can even outcross to cats from the domestic population, such as the American Curl and the LaPerm. Egyptian Maus, Japanese Bobtails, and Turkish Vans can outcross to domestics from very specific parts of the world. Considering the rarity of some of these breeds, these outcrosses are essential lest the gene pool becomes self limiting.

If you go back far enough in the pedigrees, all cat breeds can be traced back to the domestic population. There is no purity, just pedigrees. This is why CFA registers pedigreed cats, not purebred cats. And as one of my favorite judges has said, "all cats have pedigrees, but some are known only to god!"

Curiosity compells this question - why are reg cats not parentage verified? It seems to me the margin for error with sire is pretty great??

Just a slight correction, Ocis are still outcrossed to Abys to widen our gene pool.

Sincere apologies! I didn't realize it was still an option for the breeders. Is there a deadline on the outcrosses? For example, some breeds have until 2015 before they have to again ask for permission from the CFA board to continue to use their approved outcrosesses.

CFA it's 2015, I don't know about over here.

I do know there are currently no first generations here (gen 2 is the earliest), but in New Zealand there are several breeders outcrossing. NZ does not appear to have a cut off date.

Missy is right- Abys are the only allowable outcross in Ocicats and that's soon to expire in the next few years.

This is all so interesting..thank you for your posts! I hadn't thought of it that way. I guess even those breeds that claim to exist for thousands of years can't really be documented since they have not been kept track of for as long as say an equivalent dog breed. I STILL would think (and this is just my take on the term, coming from dogs) that purebred would refer to cats whose traits breed true over a few generations. I guess that's a lot harder to determine in the cat!

Using that logic, you could say the same exact thing about dogs -there are no real "purebred" dogs cause all of them trace back to dogs/wolves that were domesticated.