Bengal Cat Anesthesia and Bengal Cat and Ketamine

Well, it is hard to find specific information about the dangers of anesthetics to Bengal cats in particular. Anesthesia is dangerous to all animals including people. There is a chance that the cat will die during anesthesia. I heard while talking at a vets that 1% of cats die under general anesthetic.

Bengal cat photo by Helmi Flick with her permission

Please balance the pros and cons before agreeing to have your cat anesthetised for any operation. Dental cleaning comes to mind. The Cat Owner's Home Veterinary Handbook does not give a warning about Bengal cats under anesthetic. Neither does it mention Ketamine in relation to Bengal cats.

However this excellent book states that thin cats without extra weight or fat should be accomodated in terms of the amount of drug used because they have an increased sensitivity. Bengal cats are firm and fit without fat, usually. This might be a factor.

A visitor to my site says that Ketamine should not be administered to Bengal cats. Vets should use Isoflourane instead. She is a breeder I believe and she made a comment on the following page about Anesthesia and Cats, which provides more detail on this subject. Beware of anesthetics, please.

On a related subject tigers can be killed by a anesthetic. This happened accidentally can you believe it. Please read this story.

Infertile F1 and F2 Bengal Cats

It is almost common knowledge that the first generation (first filial "F1) male wildcat hybrids such as the Bengal cat and Savannah cat are infertile. Almost all the F2 cats are infertile and some F3's are infertile. This makes the breeding of these cats more complicated obviously.

The question I have is, why are these higher filial wild cat hybrids infertile? In the wild inbreeding between say Siberian tigers has caused infertility. I know that. But I am not sure why cross breeding a wildcat such as the Asian leopard cat and a domestic cat (American Shorthair) causes the male offspring to be infertile.

For the natural processes of an animal to be impaired something has to be wrong - correct? I can only conclude that it is unnatural to cross breed a wildcat with a domestic cat. If it happened in the wild (and it does occasionally apparently) the male offspring would not be able to procreate.

A Google search does not throw up an answer. All the breeders sites refer to infertility in F1s etc but don't explain why.

See an F1 Bengal Cat.

Tips on Buying a British Shorthair

Female Blue tabby British Shorthair Kitten
Photo by e³°°° (Flickr)

What should you do when considering buying a British Shorthair. Well, I think you have got to try and find the best breeder in your area or you might get lucky and find a purebred Brit SH that needs rescuing. This can happen but unusually because the documentary evidence that the cat is a purebred is probably not available to the rescue center.

It is said that you pretty well have to visit the cattery. This is to check out facilities, ask direct one-to-one questions and to let the cat chose you! One failing I feel of the cat associations is that they take no responsibility to rank their affiliated breeders or to ensure that they meet certain standards so it is hard to know who the good and bad breeders are.

Breeders are usually small businesses (hobby business) and they socialise their kittens by letting them run around their home interacting with other kittens, other animals and people including visitors.

There should not be so many kittens swarming around as to give you a feeling that the breeder is unable to give adequate attention to each individual. Kittens should be seen in the house not in sheds where they are not being socialised.

The kittens should not be fearful of the presence of visitors. Is the house clean and hygienic? Do the kittens look healthy? It can be hard to tell sometimes as some illnesses, even fatal ones, can show few obvious symptoms on first impressions and it is more difficult to be objective and observant when visiting a strangers house to select a cat companion that you are keen to adopt.

Rough indicators of kittens that are not in the best of health are:

• runny noses
• fleas in the coat (black salt and pepper grains in the coat - why not take a flea comb and test!)
• dirty ears
• traces of diarrhea (check the litter boxes and are they full of feces and urine?)
• over-round stomachs
• bare patches on fur.

Esther Verhoef gives the good advice that if there are signs of illness in the cats you should not visit another cattery in the same day to avoid spreading disease.

I would not accept any excuse from the breeder on the subject of apparent ill health in kittens.

British Shorthair Weight Problem?

I have heard about this on the internet and a book I have on the British Shorthair (British Shorthair Cat by Esther Verhoef) says that they, "have a tendency to put on weight - sometimes too much of it".

British Shorthairs are meant to be cobby (cat fancy language for stocky looking - solid, rounded and substantial).That is what makes them what they are.

Advancing years makes our cat less active and it said that the British Shorthair is "not naturally the most active of cats".

Neutered and spayed cats also have a slight tendency to put on weight. Note though that neutering should be carried out after the male British Shorthair has fully developed because neutering stops the build up of that masculine look. I think you will find that cat fanciers agree with this assessment.

These are the factors that might lead our British Shorthair to put on weight. The more weight the less active and this is a negative cycle.

The only way to deal with this potential problem is by providing a high quality diet and to ensure your cat exercises in some way or other. That usually means that you have to play with your cat! Certain cat foods are designed for overweight cats such as Hills c/d or r/d (prescription). But these are dry foods and an exclusive dry food diet is not recommended.

See also cat obesity.

Bengal Cat Health Problems

All cats have health problems of some sort as do all humans. Purebred cats tend to have a propensity to certain genetically inherited illnesses to a lesser or greater degree. It depends mainly on the breeding of the cat breed and the number of foundation cats that were used to create the breed. It also depends on how closely selective breeding takes place.

As I remember it, the Bengal cat is founded on a small number of "foundation cats" (e.g. Millwood Tory of Delhi). Jean Mill the cat breeders who created this breed used certain individual cats that are the cornerstone of this breed. This was in the 1970s and 80s. Testing for genetic illnesses was probably in its infancy then. I don't know how carefully she focused on health issues. I do know that she seemed by my standards to treat her cats with less than the kind of care I would hope for.

Anyway, the Bengal cat does have some well-known genetically inherited diseases that need to be checked out before buying. Breeders should be asked questions about these diseases. Have any of their breeding cats ever suffered from them, for example?

The diseases are: HCM (Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy) and Progressive Retinal Atrophy. I discuss these on this page. There are links to more on the page.