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Pedigree number hiding

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What is a pedigree?

Pedigreed cats have a pedigree, which has a similar structure in all organizations:

    Name of organization Registration-number
Name of the cat Date of birth Sex Breed and colour code
    Breeder Additional information
       
Parents
1st generation
Grandparents
2nd generation
Great-grandparents
3rd generation
Great-great-grandparents
4th generation
Sire      
 
   
 
     
 
   
 
Queen      
 
   
 
     
 
   
 

In some organizations the pedigree form is in landscape, in some it is in portrait format.

Depending on the organization, 3-generations-pedigrees or 4-generations-pedigrees are issued, but also pedigrees with more generations (a question of money, how much the breeder is willing to pay for a pedigree).

The cat has a name, mostly consisting of

bulleta first name
bulletand a cattery name.

Cattery name

Each organization registers cattery names (quasi the family name of the cat) by its own. There is no central registration of cattery names for all organizations. Thus the same cattery name may exist in different organizations for different breeders. It might even happen that the same cattery name appears several times in the same country, but belongs to different breeders of different organizations.
The cattery name is chosen by the breeder and is an artificial name.

Each organization has its own regulations, how a cattery name must look like, how many letters are permitted for the cattery name, if the cattery name is used as prefix or as suffix. Mostly those regulations depend on the technical equipment of the organization, i.e. how intelligent their database is and which pedigree program they have.
So, when you find such restriction that the name of a cat may not be longer than 30 characters - including also blanks and punctuation marks, one immediately knows that the pedigree program or mostly the database is not very intelligent.

There are also still existing organizations, which drop the cattery name. Thus, one cannot see, from which breeder a cat was bred.
Just imagine, your own family name will be dropped, when you change your citizenship.

And there are organizations - like the WCF for example, or like some FIFe-members, which add the country code to the name of the cat, to indicate that the cat was imported.
So, you can imagine, how good the sorting of a database may be, when the country code is added in front of the cat's name.

First name

Also the first name of the cat is chosen free.

There are also very different rules in each organization.
In some organizations the names of the kittens of one litter must start with the same letter, in alphabetical order. The 1st litter must start with the letter A, the 2nd litter with B, the 3rd litter with C, and so on. Some organizations order, which letter is used for all litters for the entire year, independent from the breeder, all litters must start with the same letter.
Some organizations have no rules, thus the name of each kitten of a litter may start with another letter, which makes it a bit more difficult to find out, which cats belong to the same litter.

Registration number

Also the registration number is very different in each organization.
Some organizations have 2 registers, a LO-register and a RIEX-register.
Cats whose ancestry are all of the same or a closely related breed, are registered in the LO-register.
Cats resulting from cross breeding are registered in the RIEX-register (experimental register).
And strange enough, sometimes also cats from certain (mostly non-recognized) colours are registered in the RIEX. Thus the sense of a RIEX is completely perverted.

Some organizations have very detailed rules, which breed is permitted to be mated with which breed. Other organizations have no rules.
Then LO or EX resp. RIEX is added to the registration number, which is mostly a consecutive enumeration.
Some organizations do not make a difference between "normal" breeding and experimental breeding.
Some organizations also register the registration-number of origin, where one can see, in which registration body a cat was registered for the first time.

So, it is quite common practice, to transcribe the pedigree of a cat completely, when it is imported from another organization. This is a good source to create income. It is - as so often - all about money.
Thus, many cats may have 2-3 registration numbers, which is very confusing.

Breed and colour code

Each pedigreed cat belongs to a certain breed and has a certain colour and pattern. This is encoded in every organization.
These breed- and colour codes are very different.
CFA uses a number-system, GCCF uses breed numbers, numbers and letters for the colour-code, FIFe uses 3 letters for the breed and numbers and small letters for the colour-code (the so called EMS-system = Easy Mind System), in the WCF each member may use its own coding system, etc.
Mostly in the first 2 generations the colour and pattern is fully written, but also the naming for colours and patterns might be different.
At http://www.eurocatfancy.de/en/nav/faq/colourcode_system.html you find a table of the various breed- and colour-coding systems.
One must study those codes to understand them.

Titles of cats

Each organization has its own titles, because it has its own show system.
You find an overview, which titles exist in which organization, at:
Shows/titles.html

In some organizations cats having a title from its own organization are written in red or bold letters.

But, not every organization transfers the titles from another organization.
If the titles are transferred, they are marked with a special sign or written in brackets. Such cats are mostly not written in red or bold letters.

There is no consensus amongst the various organizations concerning the titles or how the titles are abbreviated.
There is also no consensus, if titles are transferred or not.

Additional information

If there is any additional information of the cat recorded on the pedigree, depends very often on the breeding rules of an organization, if it has any.

An additional information may be:
bulletTest results - if a cat has for example a negative PKD-test result, or if a cat has a hearing certificate (audiometric test in white cats).
Unfortunately it is not ruled in every organization that certain tests are mandatory.
bulletBlood typing - which blood type a cat has, which might save the survival of kittens, if the blood type of the sire fits to the blood type of the queen.
Most of the cats have blood type A. But there are breeds, like British Shorthair, Exotic, Cornish Rex, Devon Rex, Somali, Sphynx, which have a rather high percentage of blood type B. And this can cause severe survival problems for the kittens, if their mother has blood type B and the father has blood type A, as very strong antibodies are built in blood type B against blood type A.
bulletMicrochip number - still not all breeding animals are micro-chipped. Also here the rules vary strongly between the organizations.
It would be much better to use the microchip number instead of a registration number, because the microchip number is unique. The same registration number can exist in different organizations, because there is no consensus between the organizations.
bulletLitter size - Also this figure is not recorded in every organization. One can see from the litter size, how a breed developed during the last years, when the litter size has decreased, which is already a fact in some breeds.

What is a pedigree?

CFA gives the following definition, what a pedigree is:

PEDIGREE - A form on which a cat and its background is recorded for three generations back.

PEDIGREED CAT - Usually refers to a cat whose heritage is known, documented, and registered. Allowable exceptions are those specified under individual breed registration requirements.

 

See: http://www.cfa.org/articles/glossary.html

In TICA it is presumed that everyone knows, what a pedigree is.

Also in FIFe it is presumed that everyone knows, what a pedigree is.

And also in the WCF it is presumed that everybody knows, what a pedigree is.

Transfer

What is that?
Many organizations register, when a cat gets a new owner, especially when kittens are sold by the breeders.

Green Slip

In CFA the new owner receives a green slip, where the dates of the cat, as described above, are recorded, and where sire and queen and the breeder are recorded.
With this green slip the new owner may apply at CFA for a full pedigree.
It is not common practice that pedigrees are issued for litters. A breeder registers his litters, but nothing more, and does not receive pedigrees automatically.

Blue Slip

In TICA the new owner receives a blue slip, where the dates, as described above, are recorded, where the sire and the queen and the breeder are recorded.
With this blue slip the new owner may apply at TICA for a full pedigree.
It is not common practice that pedigrees are issued for litters. A breeder registers his litters, but nothing more, and does not receive pedigrees automatically.

Transfer in FIFe

Each FIFe-member has its own form, because FIFe does not have a central registration, each FIFe-member issues its own pedigrees.
It is mandatory for FIFe-breeders that his own club issues a transfer paper.
It is also mandatory that cats (also kittens or neuters) can be sold or transferred to a new owner only with a pedigree.

 

© katzenzeitung 3/2007 Updated 11/2011


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