White as cherry blossom, white as sea foam, white as whipped cream in a porcelain dish. They're the white cats, of whom Paul Valéry wrote, 'Leur fourrure a l'éclat des glaciers baignés d'aube.' ('Their coats have the dazzle of dawn-bathed glaciers.'*) They're so glamorous, one could almost be excused for presuming a white forest cat the result of 'creative breeding'. I've been informed by well-meaning old bats ('Wouldn't want you to make a mistake, dear') that of course they're not pure; Persian blood must have been mixed in to get the color. 
This in spite of the fact that their fur quality is nothing like a Persian's, not to mention their head and body shape and long, straight profile. Some people have called them 'salon cats', fit only for sitting around on cushions. ['Booor-ing,' says Fenja over my shoulder.] And one guy told me that white cats, for lack of camouflage, could never survive in the wild. These are the folks who think the only true Skogkatt is a brown tabby. Of course, tiger stripes are a great camouflage in the forest, as are red and tortoise-shell against autumn leaves, and black and blue in a rocky landscape. All these colors were represented among the first forest cats exported from Norway. The whites just took a little longer to reach us.
When Jette Eva Madsen (Felis Jubatus) first showed Flatland's Avedine, in February 1986 in Copenhagen, the purists were shocked. (Maybe jealous?) 'It's an albino,' they said. 'It's a hybrid!' One ugly name after another. But, as Jette says, they couldn't stop looking! And they've been looking ever since. Meanwhile, the beautiful Avedine is European Champion and bears the title Distinguished Merit in honour of her many titled children -- 25 at present count, in a variety of colors. This year's World Show in Geneva looked almost like an 'Avedine family reunion'. There were 4 of her children there, 14 grandchildren, 21 great-grandchildren, and 7 great-great-grandchildren! All this by way of pointing out that she's extraordinary not only for her white fur, but also for a fabulous look that has stamped itself on generation after generation of kittens.
So where do they come from, these white Norwegians? Like all our other beauties, they come out of the woods, the fjords, and the snow. Arvid Engh of the Norsk Skogkattring told Judith Zuurveld there were lots of white semi-longhairs in Rjukan-Telemark, where he grew up in Norway. He said they had always been there -- and he really didn't think they had Persian ancestry. In Jaeren, south of Stavanger on the southwest coast of Norway, there are supposed to be many white Forest Cats running around the countryside. Randi Grotterød (Torvmyra's) tells of an odd-eyed white cat, born in 1942, that lived on her grandparents' farm when she was a little girl; it was a famous hunter and fighter and lived to be 18 years old. Some salon cat! As for the question about camouflage, she has a succinct answer: 'In Norway we have snow almost 6 months a year.' 'Nough said!
I don't know why the white cats didn't arouse as much interest originally as the other colors. Perhaps the breeders preferred working with colors they perceived to be more popular. Avedine was the first white to leave Norway, and that was already 9 years after the FIFé standard had been granted. But as we've seen, the 'snowcats' were there all along. (White is not a 'new' color with Maine Coons either - a white MCO, raised by a Mrs. Pierce, was shown in Madison Square Garden in 1895.)
Flatland's is by no means the only cattery in Norway to include whites in its repertory. One thinks for example of Griselda av Gjernes, imported by Margarete Leleither into Germany in 1986; her lovely granddaughter Graciella av Trollsfjord, among others, continues the white tradition in that country.
Way back in some of our best NFO pedigrees there's an odd-eyed white female named Grynet, 
born in a litter of four whites before the NFO received breed status in 1977. These cats all lived in the country and chased mice, and Grynet, who stayed with the breeder, was the mother of Charlie av Hanevold, who also had a white sister. From Charlie and the unforgettable Tussi (who died in 1991 at age 14) we get Torvmyra's Eviva Solterona. Among Solterona's offspring are Torvmyra's Orchide, who, through the Naima's Cattery, has so influenced the Swiss NFO's, and Torvmyra's Othilina of Danièle Rocchi’s 'Pendjari' Cattery, of great importance to the breed’s foundation in Belgium and France. Grynet's father was an unnamed white knight with blue 'breakthrough' spots, and her mother was a brown mackerel tabby named Rusken. In 1979 Rusken had another litter of 4 whites. She died a few days after their birth, but the kittens, hand-raised with a baby bottle, all grew to adulthood. Of the four the breeder kept one, and that cat, now 15 years old, is still with her today.
So as we see, they were there all along, hunting, breeding, sleeping by the hearth, and waiting to join their colored brothers and sisters on the show podium. They even put in an appearance in Norse mythology, where they are said by some to be the famous cats who pulled the chariot of the goddess Freyja. In modern times, the first white to be shown was a cat named Nøste. Jette fell in love with her photo in Skogkatten, the Norsk Skogkattring’s newsletter, and jumped at the chance to buy a white kitten from a new litter at Rigmor Syverstad’s 'Flatland's' Cattery. That was Avedine, daughter of Christiana's Rudolph, a brown mackerel tabby, and a lovely white lady named Claire.
Behind Claire's name in our pedigrees one sees only two blank spaces, but the courtship of Claire's parents is one of the great Skogkatt romances. Mama was a black-and-white, one of 5 novice cats belonging to Ms Syverstad about 10 years ago. Papa was a macho white guy, who hung around the woods near the house, but was too shy (or too wary) to come inside. He doesn't have an official name, but to me he's Wotan the White Wanderer.
I've often imagined how it must have been. Some folks might say he was a ne'er-do-well, that he was taking advantage of Claire's mother in order to cadge a free meal. But I prefer to think it was true love. He tried to talk his lady friend into running away to a life under the stars. He hung around night after night, playing his guitar and singing under her window, until finally they let her come out to join him. The honeymoon was passionate but brief. Of course she loved him. But how could she desert her humans? They'd always been so good to her. And how would she take care of her babies when winter came? Why didn't Wotan come in and live with them? He was tempted. And it tickled his heart to think of the little ones coming. But he couldn't picture himself lying around on a sofa and having his picture taken, being combed and bathed, and hauled around for people to ooh! and aah! over, and talk about his ears and tail. Man's got his pride after all, man's gotta hang on to his liberty. And so he went his way, waving his plumy tail, a little heavier of heart, but drying his tears and singing, like Cole Porter's Wildcat Kelly: 'Don't Fence Me In'. Claire's mama was sad, but when the kittens came she knew she'd made the right decision; her humans were happy, and her babies had a home. And little Claire turned out just like her handsome white father. It was only on full-moon nights that Mama allowed herself to think back to the days of her great love story, and ..................
['Paauulaa! You're anthropomooorphizing!'
'Don't be jealous, Fenja. Just because Fisher Blue didn't sing under your window. You got your kittens anyway.'
'You call that romance? Being grabbed by the scruff of the neck ...'
'Careful. This is a family magazine.'
'You misspelled anthropomor ....'
'Thank you.']
All the same, it's a true story. The white vagabond ate all the food that was put down for him, but could never be lured into the house. In the end, Ms Syverstad took the risk of allowing some of her females outdoors, in hopes of getting a mating, and Claire was the result. Claire herself had only one litter, but through her daughters Flatland's Avedine and Flatland's Alexis she has found her way into Skogkatt legend and some of our classiest pedigrees.
In 1991 white NFO's made their debut in France. Bred by Monica Chopard-von Ritter of Switzerland, 
they came from the first litters of GIC Isak-Dinesen Felis Jubatus, Best Swiss Semi-longhair Cat, of 1990. (In 1992 his daughter Naima's Zora, belonging to Nelly Brosselard, was Best Swiss Kitten. Their names are Naima's U-Fenja (owned by Paula and Lee Swepston), Naima's U-Farouk (Philippe Kiefer), and Naima's U-Ellis (Sophie Demay-Grolière). All are grandchildren of Flatland's Avedine. Later 2 white cousins joined them: a young female, Skovtur Felis Jubatus, belonging to Nathalie and Sylvie Olivet and Ragnar del Valhalla (I) (Geneviève Cournud).
At the FIFé World Show in Geneva (1994) there were 14 whites among the 121 forest cats registered -- a high percentage considering our 9 color groups. In Germany's 'Top Twenty 1993', the Norwegians were represented by a beautiful white female, EC Ingrid-Sletten Felis Jubatus (owned by Ulrike Wahl). In Denmark, last year's 'Top Ten' adult cats included two white NFO males, EC Harald Rein Felis Jubatus (owners, Minna and Kjeld Krogh), and GIC Norsk Skogkatt Felis Jubatus (Jette Madsen and Martin Kristensen). The latter compounded his honors by being, in the very same year, one of the 'Top Ten' kittens as well! Judith Zuurveld notes that in the Netherlands group 9 has become one of the most popular and successful, and that almost every breeder owns at least one white cat.
They're with us to stay now; one sees them at every show and, more often than not, on the platform for the final nominations and bests as well. From the public one hears cries of delight rather than shock: 'Oh, isn't she beautiful! Do they really come in white too?' Oh yes, they really do. The white forest cats. White as winter moonlight. White as innocence. White as snow.
Paula Swepston © May, 1994
Chatterie de la Maison Forte
NOTES & ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
*The poem quoted is 'Les chats blancs' by Paul Valéry. The English translation is by David Paul. The drawing of 'Wotan' is by Danish breeder Ann Stougaard©, and is used with her permission and that of the Norsk Skovkattering Danmark.
My thanks to Randi Grotterød ('Torvmyra's', Norway), Jette Eva Madsen ('Felis Jubatus', Denmark), and Judith Zuurveld ('Bergansius', Netherlands) for helping me collect information, and to GIC Naima's U-Fenja who supervised the typing and printing of this article!
Post Scriptum: A lot of things have happened since this article was written in 1994, one of the nicest being that in Lisbon, April 1995, an odd-eyed white male NFO was chosen World Winner Kitten 1995. His name is Skovhugger Felis Jubatus, and he belongs to Vibeke and Kjeld Jorgensen of Denmark; his father is GIC Norsk Skogkatt Felis Jubatus, mentioned above.
The top-ranking adult NFO in the international Skogkatt of the Year 1996 competition was a white named EC S*Arrow's Amorina, owned by Cecilia Crawford of Sweden. EP/EC T'Annes Sven Jutte, a white neuter male bred and owned by Anne Weijman, was the 'Best Overall' Norwegian in the Netherlands 'Top NFO' list.
Naima's Zora, (now European Champion), was Best Adult Swiss Cat for the year 1994. Skovfyr Felis Jubatus and Naima's U-Fenja are both European Champions now and have retired, leaving show business to the younger generation. Fenja's son EP Jolly Cotton de la Maison Forte has been waving the snowcat banner chez Swepston, as has a daughter, IC Jezebel de la Maison Forte, belonging to Swiss breeder Céline Kuratli. In the Maison Forte breeding program, Fenja's odd-eyed daughter, IC Orchidée Blanche de la Maison Forte has replaced her mother, who remains 'Queen Cat' and an enthusisatic babysitter. In her first year of show business Orchidée was #5 kitten on the French Top 10 list for 1998 - # 4 among the kittens from French catteries, and #5 kitten, Årets Kontinental Skogkatt 1998, Norsk Skogkattring Norway. Jolly Cotton placed #13 among the international neuters in the first Skogkatt of the Year competition (1995), #3 in the Swiss Top Ten of 1996, and # 1 in France in 1997.
At the 1998 FIFé World Show in Poznan, Poland, another descendent of Avedine became World Winner Kitten: Skakmat Felis Jubatus, white, blue-eyed female belonging to Martin Kristensen. Skakmat compounded her honors by winning again in 2000 in Prague; with titles, her long-winded name is now EC WWK98, WWA2000 Skakmat Felis Jubatus.
And so it goes....
Photos of Maison Forte cats: Paula Swepston ©.
Return to NFO home page
