Head: The skull is a modified wedge showing a slight curve from muzzle to cheek, with a visible, but gentle, rise from the bridge of the nose to the brow. The muzzle is broad and well defined with a suggestion of squareness and in profile shows good length. The chin is strong and the jaw firm with a proper bite. The moderate whisker pinch is not too severe. The head is carried gracefully on an arching neck. An allowance is made for jowls on mature males.
Eyes : Large almond shaped. Angled slightly upward toward the ears with more than the length of an eye apart. All eye colors except blue allowed. No relationship between coat and eye color.
Ears: Alert, moderately large, and set so as to corner the upper, outside dimensions of the head. If an imaginary horizontal line is drawn across the brow, the ears should be set at a 45 degree angle, i.e., neither too high nor too low. When they occur, ear tufts extending vertically from the tips of the ears are a bonus.
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Neck: Arched.
Body: Large, fairly long, semi-foreign, powerful, but never massive. Fairly deep chest. Well-developed bone and muscle structure.Paw: Moderately long, powerful, and muscular. Compact, oval paws.
Tail: Fairly long, medium-slim with only a slight taper and with a dark tip. Coat: Hair is short but long enough to have several bands of color. Fine, smooth, satiny coat with shiny highlights. Spotted and agouti coat (spotted tabby coat). Each hair, except those at the tip of the tail, has several bands of color
The recognized colours are:
- brown (or tawny) - chocolate - lilac - blue - cinnamon - fawn. These six colors also exist
in silver varieties. All colors must be clear and pleasant. The lightest coloration is normally found on the face, chin, and lower jaw. Markings consist of hairs with darker tipping. They should be clear and distinct. They are darker on the face, legs, and tail than on
the body. Dark tail tip. Tabby "M" on the forehead. Mascara markings around the
eyes and cheeks. |
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How it started:
A spotted athlete with mascara markings around her eyes "Ocicat" is a combination of the words "ocelot" (a spotted wild cat of the Americas) and "cat." Indeed, this breed has a spotted coat that makes it resemble a small wild cat. In 1964, Virginia Daly, a breeder in Berkeley, Michigan, crossed a Siamese - Abyssinian mix with a chocolate point Siamese in an effort to obtain tabby point Siamese cats. A male in the litter named Tonga and wearing an ivory coat with gold spots was unfortunately neutered.
Daly continued her work while other breeders, including Tom Brown, crossed Abyssinians, Siamese, and American Shorthairs in order to obtain the Ocicat's current morphology. The breed was officially recognized by the C.F.A. in 1986, and T.I.C.A. published a standard in 1988. In 1989, the first Ocicats were sent to France. Though popular in the United States, the Ocicat is still very rare in Europe. |
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