Do you want to find a real Siberian in Siberia? A story of one true Siberian that found his owner.

This letter is published with permission of the author - Marina Zamyatina

I learned from my own experience that Siberians need to be preserved because today they can be easily registered in the Red Book (the book of disappearing species in Russia), there are so few of them left.

My cat – Rembo (Rem or Bomber how we call him at home), born 1997 (10th of September), date is calculated with approximately 1-2 weeks difference because the teeth were changing when he already lived with us. He is medium size for this breed (8-8.5 kg, weight of large Siberian is up to 10-11 kg), but he is big in comparison to other Siberians I have seen at the shows, he has a “forest” colour – black with stripes (n2309) with little white spots on the belly and one white tow. Rem is very massive, muscular, stands low on his legs, with large head in a form of rounded triangular, with medium size yellowish-green eyes, small ears with well seen tassels; he has a medium size tail. The fur is semi long, it’s shorter on the shoulders, in winter he has very good collar and “pants”, tail is also very fluffy in winter. The fluffiness is very different in winter and summer: in summer almost “bold” (almost like short haired cat), in winter very fluffy, almost like Persian, but the fur is very different from Persian – very heavy, with quite thick overcoat all over his body which makes an illusion of oily fur, the structure is also different from Persian one.

Rembo looks much like a wild cat. He is a very smart cat who is able to make personal decisions in difficult situations, he is very calm, very love giving but not annoying, doesn’t show aggressiveness with people, lives peacefully with all our house animals (doesn’t touch our chicks but catches other birds that fly into our yard); he feels all right in the car and train (didn’t fly plane with him yet). Absolutely for sure, he considers himself “the head of the family” and takes care of all members – two and four legged ones. He is never obnoxious, but a very tactic male – brings food to his kittens, calls us to the stuck in the fence goat, or brings to the owners a rat for lunch; in order “to feed the family” steals food from the neighbouring houses. That is why, with purpose of saving him from danger, I had to put him on the “home living style.” He is very attached to his owners, follows everywhere where he can. If I take a car to go somewhere – he will run after the car until he falls, that’s why I have to take him with me right away before he makes such heroic action again, he protests about staying with unfamiliar people. Rem is a wonderful catcher of mice and rats, and he is a dominant male in the area. Before the year 2000 he had a “free” living, now he lives in the house with exit to a cat yard. He can make concerts, especially in the mating season. He doesn’t care much about food – eats meat, fish, and dry food, soup, can eat even bread and chocolate. Persistently and steadily passes his type to next generations. Behaviour at the exhibitions is almost ideal. Showering before the show is not a problem either because he lets us to wash him by standing calmly in the water.

I started working with Siberians very unexpectedly for myself. When I was born, in 1960, I was given a Siberian female cat, which “raised” me; she considered me her own baby and even left alone her own kittens if I cried. She was a typical Siberian cat of the “forest” colour, like most of the cats in the closest villages and cities. There were also colours, like: red, black, red with big white spots all over body (mostly belly and paws), greyish smoke - but one could see them much rarer than the “forest” colour (n23). The cats were quite big, with tassels on the tips of the ears; they had short thick legs, very fluffy in winter, and almost “undressed” in summer. Females are much smaller than males, with less visible collars and pants. There were no colours like chinchilla, nobody was breeding cats on purpose, there were very few good houses and all cats had access to the street. Natural selection was very slow because many owners just killed their cats if they didn’t catch mice or rats. (Regular local rat is about 400-600 gr). Males, of course, were endlessly fighting with each other: March, April, May (in February we have frosts from -10 to -27 C), from all directions there was a loud noise of cat fights. People, who remember Siberians, will tell you the same thing. I asked many people about that and I asked a lot. In the middle – end of 60es, cats of other breeds started to come from central regions and Europe. Persians, Angoras, Siamese, and rarer other breeds appeared. Almost nobody is breeding Siberians because there is no “pure” base to work with (catteries did not exist and to the 70es-80es it was almost impossible to find a real Siberian because they have vanished among the newly introduced breeds). The population of cats in the villages also changed, but a bit later. Most cats were mixed – of all colours and types, some more or less still looking like old, typical Siberians. Probably such cats still exist in small and very isolated villages, very far where nobody goes, but there are few of them and they are hard to get. Rembo, most probably, was brought from such village; (in the house near which he was found, there are many geologists and pilots of local aviation living there who fly to such forgotten places), later he either ran away by himself or he was kicked out for an active behaviour that he managed to do in the nice apartment. Anyway, nobody saw any cats like that anymore, neither before the year 1997 nor after that. After research made among the occupants of that building (more than 160 apartments, and many of such houses around), it was found out, that somebody brought such kitten from a village, but who did it and from where – nobody knew.

My cat died when she was 12 years old in 1972. After her we had mixed cats, we didn’t look especially for Siberian. From 1988-90, when I wanted a Siberian again – I couldn’t find it in the city. In 1997, we moved to a house. One day at work, a young street male cat came into my office at the age of 5.5-6 months. He definitely chose me as his owner, and because he looked very much alike my first cat – real Siberian, I happily took him home. He is a very calm and smart cat. In the first day he took a walk in the yard, didn’t go far, and came back home. He figured right away who is who in the family; friendly accepted 2 months old puppies (already lived in the house – Middle Asian Shepard and American Pit-bull), happily played with them and brought mice for them. In the following 3-4 months – chased away all local male cats, rapidly decreased population of mice and rats (and almost got rid of them), mated all cats of our neighbours and started to rob – he stole from the neighbouring houses sausages, fish and so on. At the age of 8-9 month my good friend – felinologist has seen the cat, she proved my opinion that it’s a Siberian, besides – true Siberian, she pushed us out to the exhibition. I was working seriously with dogs and didn’t plan to do anything serious with cats. If this cat was not a Siberian like my first cat, but another breed – I wouldn’t go to the exhibition. At the exhibition we got a certificate confirming the breed and high points. And I looked at shown there Siberians, that were different from the ones that I remember very well from childhood and my current cat, and decided to work with my cat, that means also with Siberians – find a Siberian girl of “forest” colour for him, check for a “pureness” in breeding (because the origin is unknown) and get good kittens such as Rem. That was just a dream!

A cat with full pedigree of such colour (Glori Sant-Andre) I could find only in Moscow, ancestors of this cat were taken out from Omsk (it’s near us, but the selection work was only in 4 generations) and the cat is not exactly what I wanted – quite different type, definitely with mixture of European cats, not big enough, boning is not as heavy as I wanted, almost no tassels on the ears, poorly dressed. But I couldn’t find another cat – in the close to us cities type is different and very few cats at the exhibitions, they are smaller and look more like house cats. In Moscow type is very different from the type of Rem, pedigrees were not full or even opened for recognition. I didn’t have much time to choose, I only came to Moscow for 1-2 days for the show and went back, I didn’t have an opportunity to stay longer. I chose Glori also because of the reason that her parents were models of the breed at the General Assemble of FIFe in May 1997. Mating with Glory I got 4 litters of absolutely one-type kittens, usually there are 3-4 kittens born of “forest” colour and one smoke grey (with or without strips). All look very much like Rem by type. In this way, my cat proved that he is a pure Siberian. Now I can search for a needed cat of a needed type, even if she is without pedigree. I looked in my city and close villages, asked all the people I know to look for a cat that looks like my Rem, but there are almost no results. We found only 3 more or less matching cats but not without defects: all small, almost without tassels on the ears, in the litters given there were even short haired kittens or “Persian-type” kittens. This summer I found one more cat, now I think that I had a luck: big, with heavy boning, looks very much like Rem, better tassels on the ears than other cats had, also “forest” colour, with white spot on the chest – Lyusya. Her owners didn’t want to sell the cat – (she is their favourite member of the family!) but they agreed to cooperate with me: to show for certifying as Siberian and later – mating with Rem. This cat lives in apartment so uncontrolled mating is impossible.
Participating in the shows I understood that there are big problems with this breed and decided to register my cattery “Sibirskiy Dvor” (Siberian Yard) and to work on the recreation of this breed which I remember from my childhood, especially since I have Rem. In general, in Russia, and especially in Siberia, there is no interest for this breed among public, or if there is one – it’s purely commercial (everybody wants to sell something that looks like Siberian) among cat lovers, but visitors of the cat shows and just “competent” people treat them very squeamishly: Persian or Abyssinian it’s a cat! But Siberian…hmmm – cat that lives under the fence, “my friends have the same but twice smaller, ears without tassels, muzzle narrow, and beside short haired” – but if found under a fence in Siberia, it’s a Siberian. Adds in the newspapers are like that, rephrasing: “Siberian race kittens, without pedigree, mother is fluffy, father-Persian” and so on, and there are 6-8 of such adds in every newspaper. People don’t have any idea how Siberian must look like. (Visitors of the cat shows call my cat a “lynx” and some – “more educated” – Norwegian Forest Cat). The most offensive thing is that breeders and judges are very loyal towards the experiments that are done with the breed and don’t stop using in breeding Siberians with a typical Persian fur, or one of those uncharacteristic for the breed colours or features. Furthermore, there were attempts to add to Siberian breed a mixture of Siamese cat and Siberian cat with typical Siamese colour and fluffy fur under name “Neva Masquerade”! Create a new breed “Neva Masquerade”, everybody will be only happy, but what for to treat Siberians like that?! It’s often needed to bring a cat to exhibition when it’s not a season and it's “undressed” so for improving the fur and adding a show-image look to the animals – Siberians were mated with Persians receiving Siberians with untypical for Siberians colours. And using animals of those colours in breeding as the most interesting to the wide public colours widely takes place. But lately, the rich owners of villas started to be interested in this breed: rats are annoying, but it’s hard to find a cat that would be able for sure to deal with this problem is not so easy; and Siberians are able to deal with it – that’s why they are preferable cats. But such owners show their animals very rare, or don’t show at all.

end of first part

Part TWO

Go to "Siberians Half aCentury Ago" for pictures of Siberians in old times