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The Annual Norwegian Forest Cat breeders' meeting took place in the show hall in Prague on Sunday 26 March 2000 at 10h00. The meeting was organized by Martin Sanda, the first NFO breeder in the Czech Republic. In the absence of the International Skogkatt Secretary, Paula Swepston, the meeting was chaired by Jette Eva Madsen, who had prepared a discussion paper, which served as an introduction to the debate. |
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New colors
Jette Eva Madsen called attention to the fact that SVERAK is going to put forward a proposal for the new colours to be formally recognised by the FIFé General Assembly in May 2000 and asked for the opinion of the breeders attending the meeting
Richard Herrmann wanted to know the present FIFé position on this subject as well as the general attitude among the FIFé judges.
Jette Eva stressed that FIFé does not have a formal position as such, until after a decision has been taken by the General Assembly, but that many German and Swedish breeders are in favour of the proposal.
Jette Eva reminded participants that a number of cats with the new colours were presented at the seminar in Hørby in Sweden in 1998. She had found them to be pretty cats, but was convinced that colour determination will much more difficult in the future, if the new colours are allowed. She found it hard to tell the difference between certain colours today, and this problem will only get worse with the addition of the new colours.
She added that due to the conservative attitude of CFA )and probably of TICA as well) the new colours will never be recognised in the USA, putting an end to all future exports to America of NFO's with the new colours in their pedigrees.
Niels Kildekov observed that it might be a good idea to exclude silver as a separate colour, because that would facilitate colour determination.
Katja Schmatz is a member of the German Breed Council. She had noted that the more you blend the lines behind the new colours, the lighter the colour shades will become. Consequently, it is difficult to tell whether the colours are really cinnamon and fawn, she said. She had also noted that fewer non-agouti and ticked-tabby cats are being born with the new colours.
Jette Eva observed that, as a rule, there are fewer non-agouti cats being born, and that breeders in general are trying to breed out the ticked-tabby lines.
Marcel Lamers observed that NFO breeders in the Netherlands would benefit from new genetic material, not necessarily from the new colours.
Sylvain Piney-Runzis held the view that the new colours should be allowed, but that breeders should be able to choose to do without them, i.e., not to get involved with lines carrying the new colours.
Richard stressed that the German breeders working with the new colours do have a close co-operation and a common objective, which gives them strength. He also called attention to the fact that there are considerable commercial aspects involved.
Jette Eva concluded that the NFO breeders' associations should contact their national organisations, if they want them to oppose the SVERAK proposal at the FIFé General Assembly. However, it had to be admitted that the individual breeders' associations are frequently ignored by the national organisations, as pointed out by Niels Kildekov.
History of the Forest Cat Breed
Jette Eva continued with a short retrospective of NFO history, based on the pedigree of Colosseums Caroline (21.05.1970) - female ns - owners Barbara and Adrian van der Ende). She wondered how the colours blue and smoke had been introduced into the breed.
Richard recalled that the first NFO was silver, and Jette Eva pointed out that the mother of Truls was short-haired. She noted that a couple of the first Norwegian NFO breeders are still active in the cat world.
New NFO Standard
Katja observed that some of the judges are not happy with the new standard.
Richard was pleased that all NFO's nominated for BIS now have ear tufts.
Lotta Hemström noted that judges are now paying more attention to the shape and appearance of the upper part of the head, which in her view is a major step forward.
Defects
Jette Eva called attention to the fact that NFO breeders must aim to prevent the problems that have occurred in other breeds. Breeders must be more scrupulous in order to avoid caesarians, bad teeth, and tail faults. We should not continuously use cats with defects for breeding, she said.
She reminded participants that the Maine Coon was a healthy cat 10 years ago, but that now the breed suffers from a number of defects such as missing testicles, hip displacement, slipped discs underbite, heart problems, etc. The trend towards more and more inborn defects has increased, mainly due to the preference for using cats from a particular line for breeding. The problem is so serious that the Danish breed Council has been contacted by a renowned Danish veterinarian specialised in pedigree cats, who wanted to draw attention to the fact that something is badly wrong with the MCO breed in Denmark, a fact that has been confirmed by Danish Maine Coon breeders.
Jette Eva stressed that in order to avoid the same unfortunate development with the NFO it is necessary to use the widest possible genetic foundation without using other breeds. When other breeds do get involved, accidentally or otherwise, e.g. the Somali, it has led to well-documented cases of patella luxation and PRA-related blindness.
Eva Weber asked how to proceed in cases of inborn defects.
Jette Eva recommended test matings in case of serious defects. If the problem reappeared, then the cats concerned should not be used for reporduction. In case of minor defects the problem might be solved by clever and selective breeding, i.e. by not mating with two cats with bad teeth.
Richard was in favour of this idea of 'clever breeding'. He stressed that inbreeding is generally considered to be necessary in order to improve the quality of the cats, but that it may lead to problems in the long run.
Jette Eva agreed that heavy inbreeding is a way to get excellent results, but on a short-term basis only. A better solution is to mate similar-looking cats from different lines. The key to a succesful breed is to use a minimum of inbreeding.
Marcel observed that sometimes you actually have to take a step backwards in order to move ahead with your breed.
Jette Eva agreed. She had used cats from other lines that were not outstanding in any way, but whose genetics were needed for her breed. Their offspring would normally look all right, and the next generation would be more or less perfect. Ulrike Wahl confirmed that this is her experience too.
NFO Statistics
Arkadiusz Skrzypczak had accomplished a tremendous project in preparing excellent statistics regarding the success rate of the NFO, based on the results from 54 cat shows.
The results clearly show that the NFO has roughly the same nomination rate as the other breeds. Until the age of 10 months, the NFO cats have a success rate equal to that of the other breeds.
However, from the age of 10 months, things begin to go wrong. For adult cats, only 18.26% of the nominated Forest Cats will become Best in Show, while 38.75% of the nominated MCO's will become BIS. In other words, a nominated NFO has only a 50% chance of being Best in Show, compared to a Maine Coon. The same trend an be observed when comparing with the SBI and the TUA.
Furthermore, Arkadiusz had compiled data on the results in relation to colour. These statistics show that a Group 9 NFO has a far better chance of becoming BIS (38.46%) than a Group 1 (12.50%) or a Group 5 (8.00%).
The participants congratulated Arkadiusz on his work. It was concluded that statistics such as these can be very helpful in raising the awareness of breeders and judges of what is generally perceived as an unfair treatment of the the NFO's in the BIS panels.
Congratulations to this year's two NFO World Winners:
GIP Dino von Birkvel, belonging to F.& M. Welsch Riis,
and IC Skakmat Felis Jubatus, belonging to Martin Kristensen!BACK TO:
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