The Siberian Cat : Part 3 |
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Siberian Cat : How long the isolation is? | |||||
Already the official birth of the breed Siberian dates back to more than 18 years. Although the breed can still be considered as "young", the time span of almost two decades is long enough to retrospectively analyze some key points of the Siberians development and to dissect important trends, both favorable and unwanted, affecting the breed evolution and causing some quite complex problems nowadays. | |||||
That it was sometimes almost natural evolution rather than careful selection, is clearly seen by a number of quite different siberian types existing around. When selection did take place, it was often directed towards some secondary features, e.g. towards colour in lieu of breeding for consistent type. One of the most problematic issues is therefore significant differences between Siberian standards in major World Cat Associations. Siberians have been recognized in these associations in different times, and at different stages of breed development. Therefore it is not surprising that each Cat System, each Cat Club, or even each Cattery possesses a "vision" of the Siberian of its own. | |||||
At the beginning of "rational" SIB breeding, in the late 80th and early 90th, there was some type of consensus statement regarding Siberian type achieved by Soviet, and then Russian breeders regarding the SIB type. That consensus statement could be barely called a standard, just because very few (if any) professional felinologists and breeders existed then in USSR and Russia. As the result, the consensus statement has been strongly influenced by the opinions of the cat professionals from abroad, not because those people wanted to be the authors of SIB breed or standard or whatsoever, but only because of their authority due to long-term experience in felinology. Also, the attitude to SIBs (still existing and rather widespread) as to "just alley cats" took its toll. Unlike, for example, NFOs, initially SIB breed has been mostly developed by rather naïve amateurs who had moderate (to say the least) experience in felinology, and even less experience in genetics and setting up breeding programs. This is not for the purpose to state that all the people started to breed Siberians were one and all ignorant, but to underscore that the proportion of professional breeders and felinologists was unacceptably low, and they often acted separately from each other. This has led, for example, to such a big abyss between Moscow and Saint Petersburg Siberians. | |||||
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The achievement of early SIB breeders and standard writers crucial for the further breed development, was that they succeeded to capture at least some of these stable features and considered them as the breed characteristics. It was therefore knowledge-based coincidence of natural genetic background and some important "written" breed characteristics that was helped to maintain SIBs in the state of recognizable breed rather than scattered population of alley cats. Time and again I hear statements that Siberian cats have nothing in common with Siberia, that they are just alley cats of Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and they are merely an artificial breed like, say, any Persian or British Shorthair cat. It is wrong and dangerous statement, which purpose is not obvious to me. Best SIBs I know, including the famous Abakan line, Treskuchii Sibirskii Moroz Mur (Irdie),a number of remarkable cats from Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, and some other were in fact the offspring of outcrosses between the cats from European part of Russia and those from Siberia or Far East. In the case of Saint Petersburg, where cat population has been artificially restored after WWII and 900 days of siege, such outcrosses occurred naturally when cats brought from Siberia met those re-introduced from other parts of Russia. That the purposeful outcrossing of few cats of similar type and mostly known history differs from immediate arbitrary mixing of large numbers of totally unrelated cats with unknown history, is again the subject of separate discussion that is the off-topic here. | |||||
Of course, no purely "forest" cats could ever exist in the Siberian Taiga, or elsewhere in Northern Russia, simply because the 1-meter or even deeper snow layer and the complementary deep frost are both highly unfavorable for successful hunting of smaller carnivores. On the other hand, the similarities of type in the above-mentioned successful outcrosses between geographically separated animals indicate that Siberians are not merely alley cats of unidentified type, but descendants of rather definite archetype developed during centuries of strong selection pressure under harsh climatic conditions. Humans just helped these cats to survive, and by no means had they treated Siberians or their ancestors as coddled creatures that are feed exclusively by the owners and that are not allowed to leave homes. On the contrary, only cats capable to all-weather protection of crops and other stocks from rodents, birds, and other petty thieves, received the selection advantage. How Siberians developed, and to what type of selection pressure they have been subjected, is worth to remember not only to all the proponents of the "alley cat" idea, but also to all the SIB breeders. Indeed, if the archetype does existed, it is wise to follow it in breeding rather than to re-invent some sort of bicycle. Yes, the native breed is probably the alley cat, but still the cat selected under certain pressurizing conditions. | |||||
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The archetype issue is closely linked to the type description that is in turn intimately related to the breed standard. Indeed, if considering the standard for the native breed, it is worth describing those important traits that highlighted the pre-breed population of indigenous cats rather than to artificially devise certain new features not found (or rarely found) in the original stock. It is logical both from the genetics point of view and taking into account preservation of unique traits of an aboriginal breed that have been developed for centuries. Otherwise, what is the purpose to take and indigenous cats from here and there and make them a breed? In addition, if there are no such features, and one cannot use them as the anchor in describing breed characteristics, no breed can be developed. Such theses are simple, yet often they are overlooked. What is the future SIB breed development, how can it proceed towards extremalization, is broad and separate topic that will be discussed elsewhere in another essay. | |||||
What is the coloration issue, and why type must prevail over color in the aboriginal breed, is also a matter of separate discussion. Here it can only be pointed out that, whereas the concept of type prevalence has been utilized with tremendous success in SIB’s sister breeds NFO and MCO, it has often been neglected in SIBs themselves. As the result, the race for colours in SIBs has lead to sprawling of Neva Masquerades and cats of other artificial "rainbow" colours. Whether or not it helped to maintain the breed integrity, is obvious from the Fig. 3.. | |||||
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This "race over rainbow", that I, otherwise, call "the 90’s problem", is responsible for the loss of many important brown tabby lines from early 90s (some might remain in US) and for paying little attention to maintenance of the SIB archetype. As such, many breeders, judges, and just future SIB owners especially outside Russia received controversial and sometimes plainly misleading information on how the real Siberian looks like. | |||||
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Among some felinologists, the idea circulates that SIB’s coat is long and fluffy, and the fluffier the cat, the more "Siberian" it is. By following this idea, very little attention is paid to coat structure, and to peculiarities in the texture of different coat components. It is, however, relatively easy to prove the "fluffy" theory wrong. As the aboriginal cat, the Siberian was evolved to be protected from weather conditions, and from other problems associated with the environment which these cats inhabited for many years. Therefore, the coat must be water repellent, must form descent protective layer that shields animal from wind, cold and rain, as well as disallow burdocks to easily populate the coat while the cat hunts. And the coat is almost completely shedding twice a year. The cat with the cloudy nevershedding coat is by no means a member of SIB’s pride. | |||||
Which type of the coat is perfect? First, the fur hierarchy must be excellently and unambiguously expressed. Rough and glossy guard fur decorates tail, back, and shoulders. This must be supported by thick and rough regular fur that forms compact windshield and heat insulation all over the body. And the undercoat lining must be also thick and compact to prevent easy bur sticking. Finally a too long, thin, and poorly shaped fur (frequently thanks to exceedingly long undercoat) is in disharmony with the strong and compact body of a Siberian. ![]() | |||||
(Please click on the photos for a full sized view) | |||||
The form of the head is another complex and extremely important issue.
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I often hear a question: what is the so-called trapezoid form of the SIB head? Indeed, when seen straightly enface, the head of a Siberian is in the form of broad modified wedge, as correctly stated in several standards. If the head will be trapezoid from this point of view, this will dictate very broad lower jaw that is obviously impossible. The puzzle is easily solved, however, when a typy SIB is observed from the upper front view.
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Apart from the lower part of the cheekbones and whisker pads, the muzzle is formed by the upper and lower jaws. Whereas it is easy to imagine the upper jaw, there is a lot of controversy regarding the shape of chin and the overall form of the lower jaw. Statements regarding a weak and recessed chin are the major hurdle. In fact, some felinologists consider that "slanted chin" automatically means "weak jaw". This leads to a promotion of Siberian cats with extremely froggy jaws. It is not explained how a thin and, in fact, physically weak jaw conducts with the Siberian Cats behavior as the dedicated rodent hunter. | |||||
Ideally, the slightly recessed, slanted, or, better to say, rounded chin should be maintained in Siberians. This contributes to an overall soft contour of Siberian head, and in fact, is in good accord with the archetype. At the same time, the jaw of the hunter cat must be thick, to be in good proportion with massive head, and to underscore the cat’s ability to efficiently capture and immediately kill the prey. That pedigreed Siberians lose their ability to hunt, is the common delusion, to say the least. The thin, deeply slanting, froggy jaw is totally unacceptable in a wildcat. A thick, strong jaw with a rounded chin supports the correct overall breed presentation and distinguishes SIBs well from sister breeds. | |||||
To go into more details regarding original proportions of Siberian’s head, ![]() | |||||
The visible height of the ear would be only slightly more than the width of the ear base. When all these parameters, distance between ears, ear width, and ear height are applied together, it becomes clear that any other type of the ear is almost impossible without introducing severe distortion in the described correlations. In fact, the anatomical ear base (and not the part of the ear visible above the fur)![]() | |||||
What I would also like to mention, is the range and the correlation of the points that affects judging a Siberian. The first and foremost in a SIB is the head, following by muscular well-boned body (unfortunately, fat animals with bad boning are sometimes considered as better comparing to well-boned but normal animals that are seemingly lighter than the overweighed ones). Meanwhile, this is often the case in judging a Siberian, who should be "heavy". The second necessary word in the phrase, i.e. "heavily boned" is oftentimes forgotten. A Siberian with green eyes but moderately developed head and boning is often judges as a superior to the Siberian with excellent type and boning but with yellow or yellow-green eyes. This is simply intolerable. There is a number of delusions of such kind caused by very ambiguous wording in some SIB standards. | |||||
Eye shape of Siberians is one of the most controversial topics. Different standards describe almost any eye form of Siberian, from "almost round" to "oval". The degree of roundness is not defined. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | |||||
Here we approached some of the crucial points in the vision of what is a Siberian breed. In my opinion based on the observation of good number of SIBs in Russia and abroad, "rounded" and "fluffy" Siberians are sometimes treated as a "substitute" to classic Persians. As the result, there are constant attempts to "converge" the type of Siberian cat with the "Persian" style. Unfortunately, the consequences of such nostalgia can be dire for Siberians. The latter, although having very friendly and often dog-like personality, are not lap animals, but dedicated hunters, incredibly smart, powerful, agile cats with sanguine temperament. Those seeking Persian-like features in Siberians would better turn their attention to other breeds. Those looking a cat for agility competition would probably find in Siberian the best and the smartest agility performer among all cat breeds. | |||||
This article is not a Siberian standard description, although it might look like this. A number of issues important for the standard remained untouched, some topics, on the contrary, have been described with a degree of detalization that is unnecessary for the standard. No standard of particular european or american system has been taken for direct comparison. In fact, I attempted to present here the review of the discussion that took place in July 2005 when the international society of judges in felinology (IFSJ) held a workshop devoted to regular reviewing and adjusting the russian Siberian standard. These workshops nowadays gather quite a number of judges and breeders, and, importantly, they are direct successors of consensus statements on russian native breeds prepared by few enthusiasts almost two decades ago. Some of those enthusiasts are still active members of IFSJ workshops (!). I hope that other systems in the future will pay more attention to the IFSJ Siberian standard and derivatives thereof, because it is still largely developed by the same people who actually noticed the now well-known archetype and founded the Siberian breed in Russia. | |||||
© A. V. Kolesnikov, PhD, Senior Scientist, Shemyakin & Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences. Moscow, Russia, January 2004-May 2008 |