Scottish Fold Cat – Introduction

SCOTTISH FOLD CAT – INTRODUCTION

The Scottish Fold cat is really cute and adorable with its little folded ears. These cats were discovered very recently as the early 1990s.

It is known to have acquired this peculiarity that most other cats don’t, with a twist of fate that probably created this specialty breed and today makes quite an impression wherever it might go to spread the breed all over the world.

The Scottish Fold loves to be among the people. They are very much at ease when at home with a crowd around and loves attention. In addition, a Scottish fold cat gets impressed when love is showered upon it and would always want to draw attention towards it.

The Scottish Fold has a very impressive breeding history as it is not one of those run of the mill cats which have been among us for many years. It holds a special place in the pedigree of the feline family especially in Scotland.

Susie in the Tayside barn

The Scottish Fold could be considered as a sudden genetic mutation that happened in an ordinary cat and its origins could be traced back to “Susie”. Susie was a female white cat that had unusually folded ears differentiating it from other cats, which were around the Tayside region of Scotland.

“Susie’s” obscure living in a barn, where she was a mouser would have ended with her and nothing much to talk about her folded ears, if William Ross a shepherd living in that area had not noticed her.

William Ross had an inherent liking to cats and when he saw, “Susie” he waited till she littered, which she did with a local Tom cat, with all the Scottish kittens having folded ears, and he took one kitten home and named her “Snooks”.

The domesticated Scottish cat population especially the Scottish Fold should be immensely thankful to William Ross, who is single handedly responsible to have recognized “Susie” the matriarch of their breed, in the barn at Tayside.

Then to have taken her offspring “Snooks” and brought them out of, what would otherwise have been eternal obscurity, into undiluted respect and recognition as a separate and unique breed.

“Snooks” takes over

“Snooks” eventually had her own Scottish kittens and the folded ears remained, where a kitten was bred with a British Shorthair and with that the Scottish Fold was born to be named so and it today a much loved breed.

The “Susie” birth line was recognized as a distinct breed due to the fact that, when a Scottish Fold was bred with any other cat the folded ear became dormant and the breed remained recognizable.

Breeding in between the British Scottish cats was what eventually came to be recognized as a separate and unique breed and though these two neighbors may have their political and other social differences it is heartening to note that their feline compatriots hold no animosities between them.

Crossing the mighty Atlantic

The crossbreed between the Scottish Fold Vs British Shorthair did interest many cat lovers across the United Kingdom and that interest did blow across the Atlantic Ocean and whiff through to the cat lovers in the United States too.

It was not long after that in 1971 that the first Scottish Fold blue made its triumphant entry inter the land of opportunity and the story of the cat that was first seen in an obscure barn in Tayside, Scotland caught the imagination of the Americans.

By the mid 1970’s the Scottish Fold blue was a respected and well known breed in the United States and recognized as a special breed because of its unique folded ear trait.

The Scottish Fold blue was crossed with the American Shorthair and the British Shorthair but the folded ear remained a distinguishable trait in all the Scottish kittens that were and were subsequently identified as the Scottish Fold blue when they had an alluring light blue hue in them.

Distinguishable peculiarities

The scottish cat has a very friendly demeanor, is good with children and needs a lot of attention whilst needing to be always kept company and is not impressed when left alone.

Also, this cat would also pose in very awkward positions rolling over and laying on its back with the paws sticking up in the air, or would lie completely flat on its stomach.

It would also sometimes sit and likes to keep rolling over and would communicate well with other cats if any are around in a short chirpy voice and is quite friendly and not aggressive.

It would interact with people especially with children and is quite intelligent enough to challenge puzzle toys and other activities which would be thrown its way to test how it would react and has always come out trumps.

The Scottish Fold blue is a very cat to have around especially when there are children around and loves to have company. This cat shares a lot of love and likes to cozy up and lie next to humans. Scottish kittens enjoy the love and warmth that would be forthcoming.