The Maine Coon Cat

At this time of boring, dark, damp days (my god I wish I was a bear and could hibernate) with not a lot to report in the Blog let me introduce you to the Maine Coon Cat.

I am not a cat person. Dogs are my first love but I became interested in the Maine Coon in the late seventies when they were first introduced to the UK and promised myself that if I ever decided to own a cat this would be the breed I could live with. Alan loves cats so we struck a bargain - yes Alan you can have a cat but it must be a Maine Coon.

So, after much discussion about owning a cat we contacted Anita Aukett, one of the breed pioneers in the UK and were invited to her house to look at and meet the Cooney! We entered Anitas house being greeted by two Cooney boys who were honestly the size of Springer Spaniel dogs - we were blown away. Anita then brought out a gorgeous red tabby male kitten - he was adorable but not what I had in mind for my first MC. Then we were shown a tiny silver tabby female who was orignally destined for Egypt but the prospective owner had wasted so much time that she was offered to us, she was so young we wernt even allowed to touch her for fear of infection - it was love at first sight - a silver tabby is what I had dreamed of and I can tell you she have lived up to every expectation - a true companion.

The Maine Coon is the largest domestic, pure bred cat in existence. They are thought to have descended from the Norwegian Forest Cat and were taken to the East Coast of America by 19th century explorers. They are semi-long haired, usually tabby and have distinctive tufts on the tip of their ears and a very bushy tail used to keep them warm in the cold Maine winters. I could wax lirical for ages about the many attributes of this wonderful breed but here are a few points that make them a little different from your everyday moggy and other pure breeds of cat. Cooneys are very dog like, they will walk with you, help you with the gardening and steal food - just like dogs! Daisy has been known to come with me and the dogs on a two mile walk - it looks like a film from Walt Disney, two large dogs with a silver cat trotting along with them. They also have a very wide vocabulary, they dont just meow - they have a distinctive chirrup when they are happy and can talk to you when they are hungry (which is usually most of the time) - they also purr like trains!

Maine Coons are very large and although can be considered friendly to those they know are a little aloof with strangers. They are incredibly playful and will remain so for most of their life. One other breed trait that we certainly find to be true with Daisy is that she will sit next to you, not on you (possibly due to the fact that most laps arent large enough to accomodate a Cooney but also maybe because they are warm enough anyway with thier double coat so dont need the warmth of your lap!) Lastly, I dont know if this is normal for all Maine Coons but Daisy is incredibly tolerent and laid back, nothing phases her , she never growls or spits or gets upset about two large dogs bumping into her!


...and the other question most people ask? How does she get on with your large, boistrerous dogs - well, lets just say that she's in charge, what she says goes and Harvey and Bailey just go along with it - cats huh! I'm not a cat person but my God I'm a Maine Coon person! They are cool...for cats!



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