You thought your cat was fancy?
is a serious investment.
23andMe-like feline DNA tests that help breeders (and owners) test for morphological aspects or disorders start at $89 per feline. And to further the research, Hutcherson recently worked with a cat geneticist, Dr. Chris Kaelin at Stanford University, to clone one of his champion cats at a cost of $25,000.
Because each cat and kitten is an investment, breeders at this level tend to vet their potential buyers as stringently as a buyer may evaluate a seller. Contracts often stipulate that the buyer must spay and neuter their cat, and that no cat will end up in a shelter. The cats even come with a lifelong unconditional return policy.
Location is a consideration, too: Cats that are considered hybrids, like the Bengal, are illegal in some places, including New York City and Hawaii. In Rhode Island, owners of toygers — because of the Bengal in their lineage — require a permit, just as owners of a pet alligator, chimpanzee or wolf would.
Kao said these laws spring from from a stigma “that it’s a wild animal, and you just can’t have it.”
Inching toward perfection
In 2018, Sugden moved back into her mother’s home to be Mill’s caretaker. It felt like the right time to retire from active breeding, though she couldn’t give it up entirely. “I was very careful as I moved over here to send all my cats around the world to the breeders who could use each one the best, to try to spread the genes out,” she said.
But Mill passed away at age 92, not long after Sugden arrived.
“Having gotten rid of almost all my great cats, am I going to quit totally and do writing? Or do something else?” she wondered.
For now, Sugden has a new litter of big-eyed toyger kittens at her cattery, EEYAA, and feels her charge is “to support the other breeders around the world and to continue to do what I’m doing.” Breaking new ground always requires grunt work, she said, and together, they are “squinching” toward the perfect toyger.
“There are a lot of people in this world that don’t care if there’s a toyger,” Sugden said. “There are a lot of things in this world no one cares about. But no one cared if there was a Mona Lisa until we had a Mona Lisa.”