british long hair

The British Longhair is a breed of cat originating in England. This medium to large sized cat is the semi-long haired variety of the British Shorthair.

The British Longhair descends directly from the British Shorthair and their history is therefore identical until the end of the First World War. From the end of the 19th century, English breeders had noticed that British cats had particular traits and selected them to exhibit them at one of the first cat shows in 1871 at the Crystal Palace in London. They were given the name British Shorthair to differentiate them from foreign or long-haired cats. It was after the First World War, when the number of British Shorthairs was at its lowest, that the English had to introduce cats without pedigree to reconstitute the breed. They also had recourse to Persians. The consequence was the loss of physical characteristics of the breed and the introduction of the long hair gene. The English GCCF refused to register these cats and only accepted the kittens three generations after the crossing with a cat without breed or another breed had taken place. The same scenario repeated itself after the Second World War. In addition to Persian, the use of other breeds such as Carthusian, Russian Blue or Burmese is likely. Semi-long haired kittens were born regularly in British Shorthair litters. Shelved for a long time, the breed was then developed separately. France recognized this variety in 2000 and 2009 for American TICA and WCF4. The other main origin books do not yet recognize it. The British longhair remains much more discreet than its short-haired counterpart. In France, between 2003 and 2008, it represented only 0.55% of the total pedigree cats. However, the number of registrations has increased significantly since 2006, from an average of 65 British longhairs registered per year to 142 in 2008.

The character of the British longhair would be the same as that of the shorthair, that is to say a calm cat with the legendary phlegm of its origins and very attached to its owner. They are also said to be a very playful breed and do not like being carried around. These character traits remain however perfectly individual and are above all functions of the history of each individual.