GM and cats

Canadian sphinxes are good-natured, peaceful. They are easy to learn and can execute commands. Very attached to the person, love to communicate. Do not consider themselves cats, behave on an equal footing with humans. Get along with other animals. Kittens are born covered with a thin delicate coat, which disappears with age and remains only in certain places. The limbs are often curved, the skin is folded (even on the tail and legs), with an excess. Late formation (up to 2 years) is characteristic. The lifespan of sphinxes is the same as that of other cats.

The skin is thick, folds, with the appearance of hairlessness, to the touch resembles suede. May be covered with a very short soft thin down, may have a tuft of hair at the end of the tail. The skin is very folded in kittens. With age, wrinkles are smoothed. In adult animals are stored on the head, neck, slightly on the abdomen and torso. The more folds, the better. Folding should not be so pronounced as to affect the normal functions of the cat.
Hair is stored in all sphinxes on the nose, on the back of the ears, a small amount is allowed at the ends of the paws (up to the ankles) and tail. A strip of short hair runs along the back. In males, the sc***um is covered with long, close to the body hair. In addition, hair in these places may appear with improper feeding, low temperature or hormonal changes during maturation.

Canadian sphinx cats are thin-boned but strong animals of medium size with folded, hot to the touch skin. Body with well-developed muscles. Chest wide. The abdomen is rounded, shaped like a pear, giving the impression that the cat ate well. The limbs are proportional to the body, strong, muscular. The rear is slightly longer than the front. Forelegs broadly set, slightly curved. Paws oval, with long, graceful, well-developed toes. The pads of the paws are thicker than in other breeds, giving the impression that the cat walks on air cushions. The tail is very flexible, mobile, pointed from the body to the end (rat tail). A lion's tail (with a lock of hair at the end) is allowed.

The head is of medium size, in the form of a wedge with rounded contours, flat between the eyes. The length of the head is slightly larger than the width. Profile with a light stop on the bridge of the nose. Muzzle rounded, strong, with pronounced mustache pads and a strong chin. The cheekbones are pronounced. Vibrissae are usually broken and short. The ears are very large, alert, wide at the base, the ends are rounded. The inner surface of the auricles without hair. A small amount of hair is allowed on the outside and near the outer base of the ears. The eyes are oval, large, elongated towards the outer edge of the ears, deeply and obliquely planted. The distance between the eyes is slightly larger than the size of the eye. The color of the eyes corresponds to the color. The neck is muscular, strong, slightly curved from the shoulder line to the base of the skull.

Bald cats are believed to have been known to the Aztecs. At the end of the 19th century, such cats were found in Mexico and were called Mexican hairless. However, they did not survive. In 1966, in Ontario, Canada, a hairless kitten was found among the kittens of a normal domestic cat. However, the initial breeding of cats of this breed failed. The breed was small, and breeders had no experience in breeding bald animals. In 1975, in Wadden, Minnesota, a short-haired common cat gave birth to a bald cat, and later the same cat. They ended up in a nursery in Oregon, where they started the main lines of Canadian sphinxes. Naked kittens found on the streets of Toronto in the late 70's of XX century, near the site of the first sphinxes, were sent to Holland, where they became the founders of the European line of the breed. Both European and American lines crossed with both sphinxes and Devonian rexes. Devons turned out to be the only breed with which bald kittens were born in the first generation. New bald cats found in short-haired offspring are highly valued and try to make the most of them for breeding. The breed is recognized by many felinological organizations in the United States: TICA, ACFA and others. Today, most sphinxes are registered with the TICA. Canadian sphinxes have rounded, smooth body lines, which gives them resemblance to porcelain figurines. Perhaps for this they are also called the moon cat.

In the literature, there are other names used as the international scientific (Latin-speaking) name of the domestic cat: Felis catus domesticus, Felis silvestris domesticus, as well as the name Felis domesticus (originally Felis domestica since the word Felis was considered feminine at that time). All of these names are synonymous with the taxon and therefore should not be used.
As the Russian name of this taxon in the scientific (popular science) literature is used as the expression "domestic cat" [28] [29] (or "domestic cat" [30]), and simply the word "cat"

In 1758, Karl Linnaeus gave the domestic cat the binomial name Felis catus in the "System of Nature" Johann Christian von Schreber in 1775 gave the wild cat the name Felis silvestris
Based on the data obtained by modern phylogenetics, the domestic cat is one of five [25] subspecies of the wild cat Felis silvestris, and its correct international scientific name is Felis silvestris catus. The decision to assign the name F. silvestris to the wild cat, and the name F. silvestris catus to its domesticated subspecies, was made in 2003 by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature [27]. the cat will be described as a separate species, in this case the combination proposed by Linnaeus, F. catus, should be used for the name of the corresponding taxon.

Some researchers suggest that the words of various Indo-European languages denoting a cat are based on the Proto-Indo-European root "* kat-", from which the Indo-European verbs meaning "kitten" originated, from which the names of cubs of small animals in Indo-European languages later came. Other researchers regard this connection as a secondary rapprochement.
Onomatopoeic, close to the Russian "meow", are the names of a cat in ancient Egyptian (mj.w [20]) and Chinese (māo [21]).

In Russian, the word cat means either a representative of the biological species Felis catus, regardless of gender, or a female of this species. A male is called a cat, and a cub of a cat is called a kitten (plural kitten). The word cat in Russian is a diminutive from Old Russian. the word "kotka" [12], which in turn comes from the noun "cat" and is related to lat. cattus - cat [13] (so in late Latin, starting from the 5th century, in contrast to the classical Latin felis) and similar names in many languages ​​of Europe and the Middle East (English cat, Armenian k'at'u, Gaul. cath , Irish catt, Spanish gato, Italian gatto, rut gyat [14], Lezgian kats, lit. katė, German Katze, nub. kadis, Prussian catto [15], French chat). The original source is unknown, but it is believed that the word got into many languages ​​from Latin

Currently, there are about 600 million domestic cats in the world [9], about 200 breeds have been bred, from long-haired (Persian cat) to hairless (Sphynx), recognized and registered by various felinological organizations.
For 10,000 years, cats have been valued by humans, including for their ability to hunt rodents and other domestic pests.

From the point of view of scientific taxonomy, the domestic cat is a mammal of the feline family of the order of carnivores. Often, the domestic cat is considered as a subspecies of the forest cat (Felis silvestris) - Felis s. catus [5], however, from the point of view of modern biological taxonomy (2017), the domestic cat is a separate biological species [6].
As a solitary hunter of rodents and other small animals, the cat is a social animal [7], using a wide range of sound signals for communication, as well as pheromones and body movements