Why do Maine Coons have ear tufts?

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I have seen some very misleading articles on this from leading websites including Maine Coon Central. 'Ear tufts' refer to the long, stiff hair strands that sprout from the tip of the ear flap. It is hair outside the ear flap and therefore plays no part in preventing dirt and debris from entering the ear canal as stated by Maine Coon Central. 

Fantastic ear tufts on a young ginger tabby Maine Coon
Fantastic ear tufts on a young ginger tabby and white Maine Coon. Photo: Facebook (believed).

Debris is stopped by what the cat fancy call 'ear furnishings' which is the hair inside the ear flap. 

Ear tufts are purely decorative for the domestic cat and the Maine Coon. All domestic cats have ear tufts but for nearly all of them they are very slight and hardly visible sometimes.

So why do Maine Coons have enlarged ear tufts? It is because the breed standard insists on them. Here is the CFA breed standard:

EARS: Shape: large, well-tufted, wide at base, tapering to appear pointed. Set: approximately one ear’s width apart at the base; not flared.

A very definite statement of what the Maine Coon breeders have to aim for. "Well tufted" is the goal. It makes the ears look taller, larger and "pointed" as also stated in the breed standard.

So why does the CFA desire this? Because they think it looks nice. And attractive. And I suspect that early 'Maine Cats' as they were called around the 1850s has tufted ear flaps although nowhere near to the same extend as they have today.

The evolution of the Maine Coon ear tuft is due to many years of artificial selection, perhaps over more than 100 years.

Ear tufts are part of a cat's 'ear furnishings' in cat fancy language
Ear tufts are part of a cat's 'ear furnishings' in cat fancy language. Image: MikeB.

And they achieved it by selecting foundation cats with good ear tufts and taking the best of the litter of offspring and breeding them back to their parents (inbreeding) to expand and fix the appearance trait.

Maine Coon ear tufts are all about appearance. The caracal, a medium-sized wild cat species has amazing ear tufts which it is believed are used to communicate.

The caracal has the most prominent ear tufts of all the cats, both wild and domestic.

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