WE ARE A CHAMPIONSHIP BREED!!!!!!!!!!!

[macmanmatty]

All breeds in TICA -- no matter what their history or category -- are allowed to use nonpermissible outcrosses. That means you can take any pedigreed cat and outcross it to anything you like. You can register the offspring as your breed. That's just like what you can do now. And the rules will be exactly the same when you reach championship.

You will be able to outcross to Orientals -- or even to Munchkins if you have a hankering. LOL. Either way the offspring will be "A generation" and you will have to breed to the fourth generation to get back to SBT.

Category 1 breeds can only show SBT cats. The Siamese, Burmese, and many other breeds are in category 1. They can only show their SBT cats (also SBVs, but I won't get into that).

When the SV goes to Category 1, you will be able to show only SBTs. The only generation that you won't be able to show any more is the "C generation."

You will still be able to outcross to anything you like, but you will still have to then breed to the fourth generation again to regain SBT and show rights.

I think I'll stop now and continue in a different post later to tell you a few other things. But the big point -- the thing to remember here -- is that you never really had a permissible outcross, and you still won't. The only thing you lose in championship is the right to show the C generation cats.

Hope that helps -- if anyone still cares. LOL!

I did not know that you could cross any two tica breeds together and still register them? I thought each parent had to be the same breed unless there were permissible out crosses? But, I assume this applies to only registered breeds and not DSH? So you couldn't register your spotted tabby DSH as an expermintal short hair and cross to bengal to get new lines and register them as bengals? Right? So if I a cross a f1 chausie to f4 savannah I can register them as savannahs or chausies? Or both?

 

[George]

I did not know that you could cross any two tica breeds together and still register them? I thought each parent had to be the same breed unless there were permissible out crosses? But, I assume this applies to only registered breeds and not DSH? So you couldn't register your spotted tabby DSH as an expermintal short hair and cross to bengal to get new lines and register them as bengals? Right? So if I a cross a f1 chausie to f4 savannah I can register them as savannahs or chausies? Or both?

This is pretty confusing - what about the "b's" and "a's"? I guess he doesnt mention them because you cant show them at this point either? or?

 

[macmanmatty]

I know about the abc's and what they mean But what I did not know and the is what the poster I quoted is is stating is ; is that you can cross ANY two championship breeds to together and register the offspring even they would f1a's of your breed.

 

[Dr. Cris Bird]

I did not know that you could cross any two tica breeds together and still register them? I thought each parent had to be the same breed unless there were permissible out crosses? But, I assume this applies to only registered breeds and not DSH? So you couldn't register your spotted tabby DSH as an expermintal short hair and cross to bengal to get new lines and register them as bengals? Right? So if I a cross a f1 chausie to f4 savannah I can register them as savannahs or chausies? Or both?

In TICA, you *can* literally breed to anything you like and register the kittens. You are correct that a DSH or DLH would have to be registered in the Ex registry first -- to get it on the record. But yes, you can breed anything to anything and register the kittens.

TICA provides this option to breeders, recognizing that there may be one-time situations where the breeder needs to use his or her best judgment and do a special outcross -- or whatever. TICA also wants to encourage people to be honest about their breedings, so they give you the right to register pretty much anything.

There is a catch. In most of the championship breeds, if you breed to something that is not a permissible outcross (listed on the breed standard), the offspring are given an "A" at the beginning of the registration number. Usually it will be AON, but that also depends on whether you did something else unusual, such as breed back to a nondomestic species. Offspring of nondomestic species get A1S, and that "S" stays in there for a full 3 generations.

All breeds restrict the rights of a cat to be shown based on the registration prefix. In all breeds, cats with AON, BON, or CON prefixes cannot be shown in championship classes. They can be bred, but they cannot be shown. You have to breed back consistently to the same breed until the fourth generation to regain the right to show. That means AON and BON cats can't be shown, and their kittens can't be shown. The CON cats can't be shown, but their kittens can be shown *if* the other parent was SBT or equivalent.

There's another catch. TICA assigns the AON, BON, CON prefixes so they can track these cats in the breed -- and so that breeders can track the cats, as well. Every year the TICA Board of Directors reviews a report showing how many cats in various registration categories were registered in TICA within the past year. They particularly scrutinize the nondomestic source breeds, such as the Savannah and Chausie.

TICA's stated policy in the Registration Rules is that nondomestic source breeds are intended to become fully domestic and fully fertile. If the directors see that people are actually mostly breeding cats with a high percentage of nondomestic blood -- or if they see that people are continually mixing cats that come from more than one nondomestic species -- they may take action against the breed.

TICA has taken action against breeds in the past when they see evidence that breeders are not breeding to the standard, are not breeding honestly, or are not breeding toward the official goals, such as becoming a strictly domestic breed and deriving from no more than one nondomestic species.

That means that one person may get away with outcrossing Savannahs to Chausies -- or vice versa. Maybe two or three or four people may get away with it. But, eventually, if it keeps happening, the TICA Board of Directors could decide to strip one or both breeds of championship. The breeds are on probation for the first three years after earning championship. It would be simple to deny championship while the breeds are still on probation.

Even breeds that are strictly domestic and that have been in championship a long time have been punished when evidence of chronic bad outcrossing choices has surfaced. It's not often that it happens, but it happens. For example, breeds in the more lenient categories such as category 2, 3, or 4 have in a few instances been forced to move to category 1 because the directors did not like what they were seeing.

And, there was a breed called the Sterling that had its breed status completely revoked when the directors saw that the breeders were not showing much consistency in the way they bred and registered their cats. They will never get a second chance. Incidentally, not all "unusual" outcross choices would be viewed negatively.

It really does depend on whether the choice of outcross makes sense for the goals of the breed and is used judiciously. In general, TICA does not like to see cats descended from more than one nondomestic species bred together. But they are more open to nonpermissible outcrosses involving strictly domestic cats.

 

[Trish Allearz]

Very interesting! Thanks for posting that! I didn't realize everything that went into the registry (and still don't- haha!), but that was an enlightening post!

 

[admin]

Very interesting Cristy...so here is my question...we know there are breeders now breeding pixie bobs and all sorts of other cats, including the ALC, to savannahs...I don't see any way to stop them, so does this mean we will be punished as a breed if it continues? That would be terrible!!!

 

[Wyldthingz]

Yes, that would be upsetting if some fool ruins it for the rest of us! Especially someone that doesn't show, doesn't care to show or care to sell cats that are going to be show quality, but is just trying to sell expensive cats.
I am seeing Savannahs from even reputable breeders lately swinging back to that Bengal look with flashy spotting and gold backgroud saying that their cats are "superior" because of their color, meanwhile, looking strongly Bengal. I am sort of taken back that this is happening. I can only assume that they are "cattery blind" to the look of their own cats.

I think those are few however at this time.

Using other "wild" ancestry will only make the Savannah look less Savannah, and not more.

 

[Dr. Cris Bird]

Very interesting Cristy...so here is my question...we know there are breeders now breeding pixie bobs and all sorts of other cats, including the ALC, to savannahs...I don't see any way to stop them, so does this mean we will be punished as a breed if it continues? That would be terrible!!!

It all depends on what the directors perceive and how bad they think it is. In the case of the Sterling, I'm told virtually *all* the breeders seemed to be registering their litters back and forth in whatever breed was convenient to them. The Sterling did not seem to exist as an independent breed at all.

That was the perception the directors had -- so they eliminated the Sterling breed.

With the nondomestic source breeds, we already have stricter rules than the purely domestic breeds have. For example, all nondomestic source breeds go to category 1 when they reach championship -- no matter whether they are large breeds with diverse gene pools or tiny breeds with the limitations that small gene pools have. And that, I've been told, is because of some outrageous breeding practices the directors believed existed in the early 2000s.

Below is an excerpt from the breed registration statistics reviewed by the directors at the Annual last month. The report was attached to the minutes of the meeting that were posted on the TICA website. The report was labeled as from the year 2011. In actuality, because of the odd way they manage data at the EO, I don't think it covered a full year. However, they handled the report the same way for each breed. The numbers should be comparable across breeds.

In the report, the registration figures for the Savannah were:

SVN = 489
SVP = 364
SV = 243

The Savannah had more SVN cats registered than SV cats. SVN is the category that includes all AON, BON, and CON cats.

Now if you look at sort of typical, average domestic breeds, you can see:

SI = 167 Siamese

AS = 125 American Shorthair

RB = 183 Russian Blue

The numbers are much higher for the largest breeds, such as the Maine Coon and Ragdoll, but most purely domestic breeds are about the size of the three breeds I've listed here.

Does this mean that there were no SIN, ASN or RBN cats registered at all? No, it doesn't, and in fact I know there are usually a handful of nonpermissibles registered in most domestic breeds every year. But the numbers of nonpermissibles are tiny in the established, domestic breeds -- enough so that the directors don't even ask to see their numbers in the annual report.

Also, there are P cats in many of the purely domestic breeds. Category 4 breeds almost by definition will have some P cats every year because they are defined as domestic hybrid breeds. For category 4, it's okay to keep on outcrossing to the parent breeds for as long as they like. (That's why I said the rules for nondomestic source breeds are stricter than for domestic breeds.)

Are the directors alarmed at the statistics for the Savannah? As far as I know, right now they are not. I think they figure it's a new breed, and it's to be expected that there will be a lot of SVNs for a while. The SVPs will disappear soon, of course, because in championship the Savannah no longer has a "permissible" outcross.

It is the trend they will be watching. If the SVNs slowly decrease in number, no problem. if the SVNs suddenly began to increase and the SVs began to decrease, and this kept up over a period of several years, my guess is the directors would become concerned.

 

[Wyldthingz]

That is informative. Thanks!

 

[admin]

Thank you so much, Cristy! Your posts are always so informative and interesting...I guess it will be up to all of us to keep an eye on the way things are going, so we don't find ourselves in trouble.