Your Maine Coon Guide

You might live with a beautiful Maine Coon. Your cat is indoors full-time. You decide to adopt another cat to keep your Maine Coon company. You have also decided to purchase a purebred cat as a second cat. What cat breed is best suited to increase the chance that they get along well? Scottish Fold said to be good with other cats. Photo and breeder: Alexandr Anna Krivdin Obviously, the answer to the question depends very much on the personality of the individual cat concerned. However, I can go to a book in which I rely: Legacy Of the Ca t. It is by Gloria Stephens who is a former cat show judge and breeder herself. She is an expert. Note: I would ask the breeder from whom you purchase a cat to tell you about their characters. Scottish Fold: And diving into her book I quickly bumped into the Scottish Fold page. This was slightly disconcerting to me because I don't want to promote the Scottish Fold because it is an inherently unhealthy breed.  However, if we put that aside for a m...

Maine Coon cat caregivers who are really switched on and concerned about their cat's health might want to know a little bit more about diabetes mellitus which can affect domestic cats including the Maine Coon cat. It is not a disease which is directly inherited but which is the result of a lifestyle in much the same way that it affects humans. It is rare. Dry cat food Notwithstanding that statement, some cats are probably genetically predisposed to getting Type II diabetes. One well-known veterinarian who wrote a book called YOUR CAT, Elizabeth M Hodgkins DVM, believe that being overweight in cat is not a cause of diabetes mellitus. She argues that a cat contracting Type II diabetes and being overweight has a common cause; a root cause. And that cause, she believes, is dry cat food which is high in carbohydrates. She believes cats on dry cat food are predispose to hypoglycaemia and she has treated diabetic cats with wet cat food and nothing else and they have entered into remission...

This is a remarkable study for its conclusion. It was conducted in 2010.The scientists evaluated a population of 127 cats who'd been treated at the Royal Veterinary College Queen Mother Hospital for Animals in the UK between 1997 and 2005. The cats included some purebred cat including Ragdolls. They concluded that "Overall median survival from date of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy diagnosis at the Queen Mother Hospital for Animals was 1276 days".  This is saying that cats taken to this animal hospital for diagnosis and having been diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) lived for a further 3.5 years.  Comment: a very short time. Clearly the age of the cat when diagnosed is a factor which dictates the length of time that they have to live.  Younger cats lived longer after being diagnosed with HCM. That's pretty obvious and HCM can affect young cats around 4 months old. That said, we know that Maine Coons and Ragdolls are just 2 breeds with a history of HCM. The...

The question is the title to an article on the Maine Coon Central website. The No. 1 Maine Coon cat website, they claim. The question is also the title to this article. The problem is that the question doesn't make sense! 😁 That's because "Maine Coon" is the name of a cat breed while "tabby" is the name of a coat type and pattern. How to tell a Maine Coon from a tabby!? The question is daft; meaningless. Image: MikeB Many Maine Coon cats have tabby coats. So the question in the title is not comparing apples with apples or pears with pears. It's comparing two entirely different things which actually overlap in any case. The question shouldn't be asked. Perhaps the question is meant to ask this question: what's the difference between a tabby Maine Coon cat and a tabby non-purebred cat? The answer that question is that the Maine Coon cat is a very distinct and distinguished looking cat very often quite different to a medium-longhaired non-purebred...

NEWS AND COMMENT: This is a slightly strange story but it is an incomplete story as well. The headline from the Southern Daily Echo is that a Maine Coon was left for dead adjacent to Botley Road, Eastleigh, England. The Maine Coon belongs to a couple, Grace Weare, 32, and Harry Long, 31. He had become lost and they spent hours searching the area for him. Harry Long and Grace Weare. Image: Southern Daily Echo. There is a picture on the Southern Daily Echo of the Maine Coon cat after they had found him. If this cat 'Gatsby' is a Maine Coon he is a non-typical Maine Coon cat. He looks actually, without being in any way critical, more like a regular tabby domestic cat. But clearly the couple believe that he is a Maine Coon. I believe that they are mistaken.  I hope they did not pay a breeder or someone online and exorbitant amount of money for Gatsby because he does not have the appearance of a Maine Coon. I think that's a relevant point because you don't let a Maine Coon c...

A blue tortie-and-white female Maine Coon kitten at a cat show being shown off to adoring fans. I've seen this guy before in the show ring discussing the show cats that he judges. 'Blue' in this instance means a dilute tortie-and-white. The coat has a slightly faded appearance that many find attractive. The 'blue' relates to the greying up of the black element of the coat. He says some interesting things about the Maine Coon (MC). The breed should be super-super long in contrast to the Siberian cat which looks a little similar and which may have similar origins. The Siberian is relatively quite stocky (in cat fancy language 'cobby'). We know he is right about the MC being super long because the only cat breed to win the Guinness World Records longest domestic cat award is the Maine Coon. He emphasises the desired feral appearance of the MC. That's interesting. I believe that he is judging a TICA cat show as opposed to a CFA cat show as the former like th...

This domestic cat is not so much a Maine Coon as a hairy monster from another planet. An extraordinary cat right up there will the other rare and amazing Maine Coons that we see on social media. Screenshot from video below. It is almost as if there is a competition going on with breeders. The prize? The weirdest Maine Coon and the biggest. On a more serious note that can lead to problems as breeders try to out-compete each other. What do you think about this cat? Please comment. There are two versions of the same video as one is uploaded and the other embedded. The latter is a little better quality but embedded videos from social media sites tend to disappear after a while which is why I have the uploaded one as well. That will not disappear. @anakin_and_arya Giga Cat 🗿😼 #catsoftiktok #mainecoonsoftiktok #gattiditiktok #mainecoon #catlover #kittenlove #mainecooncat #expensivecat #mainecoonlovers #cattok #gatti #gigacat #gigachad ♬ original sound - Logan Chitwood He...

Ginger tabby Maine Coon overcomes his resistance and becomes a very close friend to an incoming kitten. Screenshot. This is a nice example, I feel, of a Maine Coon who was described as 'depressed' gradually forming a very close, I'd say loving, relationship with a new kitten. When first introduced to the new kitten the Maine Coon hisses. A natural reaction although it was a bit half-hearted. You can see it if you watch carefully. It is not an aggressive hiss as I've said. But what I like about the video is that it shows how a resident cat can warm to an incoming cat over time and ultimately form a very close relationship which greatly improves his life. This worked out really well for the caregiver. Bringing in a new cat to be friends with a resident cat is a bit risky. You hope there is chemistry after the initial resistance by the resident cat as happened here. It is an optimistic video I'd say as it shows that it can work really well. The close friendship between...