Why I am so passionate about Old Style Siamese
Loyal, Intelligent, Demanding, Gentle, communicative and Adorable - just a few of their many attributes
Having been a breeder for a few years I have come to appreciate the importance of retaining good lineages, and the introduction of only pure bloodlines that have a history. Pedigrees that go back many decades and produced the beautiful Siamese cat that a lot of us remember from our youth. Many of my Clients have expressed their concerns about the change of look in the Siamese and their difficulty in obtaining an Old Style kitten. Some have turned to purchasing other foreign breeds like the Tonkinese
This unfortunate situation is due in the main to the Old-Style losing favor in the Show ring of major Cat Fancies and now this beautiful looking cat is on the verge of extinction. The current Show style of Siamese, although retaining similar personalities to the Old Style, have a much more extreme look. Many of the old Siamese genes and lineages have been lost and can never be recovered, but I believe that as long as there are a few breeders worldwide who are passionate about keeping and extending the bloodlines that are left the Old Style Siamese will survive.
Things are moving in the right direction In 2010 TICA (The International Cat Association) awarded Championship Status to the Old Style Siamese under the name "Thai". So once again these lovely cats will grace the show ring. Over the last decade many more Cat Fancies around the world have also accepted the "Thai" so those of us who are passionate about our Old-Style Siamese cats can continue to promote the breed at every opportunity.
About Me - Julie
Once a Siamese comes into your life you are their slave forever
Animals have always been part of my life, there has never been a time when there was not a four-legged animal around. Being brought up on a farm I had numerous pets including calves & sheep. There were always stray cats around and kittens being born, my first proper pet was a Long-Haired Tabby Tom and we spent man y hours together along with my pony.
Through my teenage years it wasn’t practical to have a cat but I still had horses and also a Springer Spaniel who was full of energy and always getting into water troughs and rolling in cow pats.
I was in my twenties when I was first introduced to Siamese. My Godmother bought a lovely Blue Point which she had for almost 18 years. I was so impressed with this beautiful, elegant, self-assured creature that I vowed one day I would have Siamese myself. Now married to an Engineer and with a young family we were moving around the country as well as being posted abroad. Whilst in Brunei I was fortunate to see an advertisement for Siamese kittens, they were not pure Siamese (I later discovered they were Snowshoes), but they were beautiful kittens, a Seal Point and a Seal Tabby Point. The Mum was a Seal Tabby Siamese. The Seal Point female returned to England with us in the 1980’s.
I decided to go into breeding Siamese in the early part of this century, when the Children had become more independent, and we were settled in the beautiful Somerset countryside. We had land for the horses and no close neighbours so an ideal location. The hardest part was finding a Siamese that looked like the one my Godmother had had in the 70s, they seemed to be rather scarce, and I learnt that there were two styles of Siamese in the UK, the Old Style/ Traditional pure Siamese and the more modern Oriental Siamese which is generally what we see on the Show bench. My preference was for the Old Style (which has also been renamed “Thai” in other parts of the World).
With the help of other Old Style/Thai Breeders, I acquired the first of my Breeding queens and Stud boys. My focus has been and continues to be on preserving the bloodlines of these Siamese and expanding the gene pool with the introduction of Old Style Siamese (Thai) from the USA. Therefore, today I still have those original lines in the pedigrees of my cats.
