Abyssinian
Each hair is banded with several colours, so the coat has no pattern up close and shimmers at a distance. Busy to the point of restless, and rarely found sitting.
Overview
The Abyssinian is a lean, ticked, restless cat that looks like the ones painted on Egyptian walls and almost certainly is not descended from them. Genetic work points at the Indian Ocean coast and Southeast Asia, and the breed as it exists was assembled in Britain in the late nineteenth century.
The coat is the signature. Each hair carries several bands of colour, so the cat shimmers rather than patterns, and there are no stripes anywhere except faintly on the face.
Temperament
Busy to the point of comedy. An Abyssinian does not sit on a lap so much as supervise from the top of a door, and it wants to be involved in whatever is happening.
They are intensely people oriented without being cuddly, and they get bored in a way that shows up as opened cupboards and knocked over glasses. A single Abyssinian in an empty house all day is usually a destructive Abyssinian.
Care and grooming
The short ticked coat needs almost nothing, a weekly going over at most.
Two inherited conditions are worth knowing because both have a DNA test. Progressive retinal atrophy in the rdAc form causes late onset blindness, and pyruvate kinase deficiency causes an inherited anaemia. Both are found at meaningful frequency in this breed, and a breeder who tests can show you the results.
Living and exercise
Vertical space more than floor space. Shelves, a tall tree and something to climb turn a busy cat into an occupied one.
They do well with another active cat and badly with long days alone. Puzzle feeders and clicker training both work here, because this is a cat that will genuinely engage with a task.
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