I stopped by the Sandy Claws TICA cat show last weekend. My timing wasn’t very good, and I was there around lunchtime, which meant there was less happening as some of the show rings were on lunch breaks.
The two rings that were being judged were both longhairs. One ring was all kittens in various longhair varieties. This beautiful, white kitten was patient with the judge who seemed to be giving her an internal organ exam during her turn to be judged.
The second ring being judged was all Maine Coons. This kitty was very active while being judged. I didn’t really understand why there were cat rubber ducks on the judge’s table, but maybe that was just her thing. This show cat was much omre interested in the scratching post than the ducks.
Speaking of Maine Coons, they seemed to be really over represented. I didn’t take a cat census, but I’m pretty sure they were the most popular cat at the show. This big guy was resting in his cage when I passed.
Since it was lunchtime, I didn’t have anyone to ask about most of the cats I saw. I think this beautiful kitty is a silver shaded American Shorthair.
This clown is an Oriental Shorthair. His human had traveled with him all the way from Las Vegas to Orlando for the show. As you can see, this kitty is a real clown. He wasn’t struggling to get down, but he actually rolled over when he heard the camera lens clicking.
Some of the kittens at the show were absolutely irresistible. This ragdoll kitten has the cutest face!
This Persian kitten was also for sale, and a potential buyer was looking closely at him.
There were a remarkable number of Sphynx kitties on hand. While other breeds like Abyssinians and Somalis were barely represented, there were quite a few Sphinx. Maybe that has something to do with the breeders and preferences of people in our part of the country.
Not all of the cats at the show were fancy. It was surprising how many cats were on hand to compete in the household pet category. I always thought that would be a very small group, but there were a good number of the cats there, maybe 10%, who were competing as household cats.
I had a lot of questions about that category, especially, but as I mentioned before, it was lunchtime, so the humans were rather distracted and most weren’t very chatty.
Because it was lunchtime, a lot of the humans were away from their cats entirely. This meant I was left looking at cats in closed cages or show shelters, which are hard to take photos through, especially when the shelters have plastic covers. I did find it funny that a lot of the cages and shelters were decorated, usually to match the cattery name. People who take the time to attend shows often go the extra mile to make their little corner of the show floor look special, too!
I overheard a vendor saying that the show was going to be in the same location next year, but a month earlier. I will be looking forward to seeing the cats next year, and I’ll be sure not to schedule my time to visit them during lunch hour next time so I can learn a lot more about each of the cats I see.
Some shows, or some areas, just have more of one type of breed than others – we have TICA shows out here that get LOTS of Ragdolls. Maybe there were so many Maine Coons at the show because there are more breeders in your area, or the one or two breeders there had a lot of cats they wanted to show. If you had a catalog, you could see what breeders all the cats were from – and you could see how old all the cats were too!
The Household Pet category is actually often pretty large! You should enter Cupcake at a show. You just need to register her as a HHP with the registry putting on the show (TICA or CFA usually), and sign her up! If you wanted to give it a try, my human could help explain things for you.
It’s fun to go to cat shows and see the different breeds up close.
mom would like to go to one …she is going to have to check around here
To be honest, I’ve avoided cat shows. Something about it being snooty, maybe. However, due to blogging and getting to know Angel Sparkle and Summer, I am adding ‘go to a cat show’ to my list of things to do. I mean…it’s cats, right?!?
Sandy Claws—HAH! The show should have been in December. I wonder if my Aunt Karen was showing any of her froster cats. She’s had some winners and she lives in FL. That big orange Maine Coon looks like Wanda’s Parker, a old BF. Hope he won.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhh so many purrty faces
Hugs madi your bfff
What fun to see all those different cats. I don’t think I would want to put a cat through all that but I guess they all adjust to that way of life. They looked happy enough.
OMG, these are some of the most beautiful kitties we have seen.
Awesome photos! Our Mom likes visiting cat shows and watching the judging and how the cats react. Of course, she likes walking around and looking at the kitties, especially ginger ones for some strange reason. MOL!
It’s nice to see so many different breeds at the same place. Purrs
I love visiting our CFA show each year. Here we get a lot of Canadian entries and with the language barrier they aren’t always terribly chatty. The cats are still fun to admire though.
What a treat to go to a cat show. We loved seeing all of the photos you took.
We discourage our mom from going to cat shows. She would want 90 more cats! Obviously it’s just too dangerous.
(But we enjoyed your photos!)
Thy are all beautiful kitties. I love cat shows and all the vendors. I have been to the NEMO one twice.
I miss attending cat shows. CFA used to host cat shows in SC every year. Mom Paula would sit in the Persian judging booth and admire them.
She found when she attended the TICA show that there were more Bengals and Maine Coons. There weren’t many Persians. We think that’s because some of the newer breeds aren’t recognized by CFA yet.
CFA is a lot slower to recognize a breed or variation on a breed that TICA. I love CFA shows though. I show (in hhp) in both and I appreciate the way TICA treats hhp like any other class so you don’t go home empty handed, you at least get a best of color as a merit award. In CFA if you don’t final you get nothing. Which is sad if you’ve driven10 hours and stay three nights in a hotel and pay the entry fee and go home with zero points because there were 32 cats in your class. On the other hand the title means a lot because of how hard you have to work for it. I’m campaigning my little rescue Persian for Grand HHP of Distinction – one more year of 3 to go.
I don’t know why, but I just can’t get into the ” fancy breeds”. I love my rescues. I have a friend who will only purchase the Ragdoll breed. They seem to have more health issues than my ( former! ) strays.
That last one looked like a … Bengal? We like the idea of registering Cupcake as a HHP!
now the real question is, did they have a lot of cat things for sale?
You should definitely consider showing in household pet if you are lucky to have a show in your hometown! It is a lot of fun. I have 5 that I show -usually only one or two at a time. My 11 year old is working on his master titles in TICA right now. I took him out on a lark and he LOVES it.