darabo

joined 1 year ago
 

This is Tiger, she was living in someone's backyard in an area of the city north of me. Very long story short, she was captured in late January when she was a year old and I took her in to be with her brother from the same litter, who I was fostering since late October of last year (another long story). Her only interaction with humans was once in a while when she was given food by the person living in the home. 

At a year old, it's very, very difficult to socialize a feral cat and get them acclimated to the indoors. She wrecked the hell out of my bathroom when she first arrived in my place, and it's been a journey and saga with her.

About 1.5 months ago, it felt like there was little to no progress with her and I was very, very close to giving her up. However, it seems that she is being socialized, just very, very slowly.

After much hissing, biting, swatting, running away (the last one she still does once in a while and she almost swatted at me once when I offered my finger to pet her), etc, now she will let me pet her either when I'm hand feeding her (wet food) meal twice a day or if I'm giving her a treat.

But at least she's now becoming more comfortable here. Occasionally she'll either hang out by the window on the couch or rest at the end of the couch (while I'm on my side of the couch), which seems like a good sign. She's a sweet cat with the cutest meow. I hope one day she'll actually let me pet her.

[–] darabo 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

It's a "domestic short hair", aka cat.

The majority of cats nowadays are a result of massive amounts of breeding between species over multiple, if not hundreds, of generations (keep in mind that cats can and often give birth when they're around a year old and can breed 3x a year), so 15 generations means around 15 years) to the point where it's all giant mush breed wise.

Unless either they've been super isolated or specific bred as a purebred, then they're categorized less based on breed and more on their physical characteristics.

For instance, a "domestic short hair" is a cat that doesn't have long hair and has been bred within in the area/country.

Tabby cats, like the one in OP's picture, means they have a "M" shaped mark on their forehead. A calico cat means they're a tri-coloured cat. A British long hair cat means they're a cat with long hair that was born in, you guessed it, the UK.

Whenever you see cats in shelters that are labeled as specific breeds Russian Blue for instance, unless they're a purebred, it means they look like one by the roll of the genetic dice.

Unless they're specifically a purebred or specifically bred to be something (in both cases it often have health conditions due to inbreeding), anyone who tells you their cat is a specific breed is either misinformed or trying to deceive you.

There are exceptions, like Bengal cats, but even then for domestication and health purposes they've been bred with domesticated breeds for at least two or three generations minimum.

Tl;Dr: She's a domestic short hair tabby, aka a cat ¯\(ツ)

(I've worked with different cat rescue organizations and nonprofits, and I'm also fostering two semi-feral cats at the moment.)