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Leeside Abys still have gently contoured heads and profiles. Our ruddies look like ruddies. Even black ticking and black or dark chocolate paw pads with black hair between the pads insures they are never mistaken for reds.
 

The Abyssinian is a medium sized cat with a distinctly ticked coat. The color and ticking develop gradually over time, and kitten tabby marks on the legs and neck may blend in as color deepens. The intermediate build should be svelte and muscular. The wedge shaped head has slightly rounded contours, large ears, and large almond shaped eyes. Ideally, the coat should be thick and resilient. Adult females average 6 - 8 lbs., and males 7-9 lbs. The current commonly recognized colors in North America are ruddy, red (also known as sorrel), blue and fawn. TICA has also recognized the various silver colors, and most recently, chocolate and lilac Abys. The Abyssinian requires little grooming because of its short coat, but many will enjoy being groomed daily with a flea comb. Their nails should be trimmed twice a month. Their large ears require regular cleaning with a dry q-tip to remove waxy build-up. The Aby personality is not for everybody, but devotees find them intelligent, affectionate, and loyal. Mischievous and curious, they often follow their owners around from room to room. Because of these traits they are difficult to keep off of counters, coffee tables etc.; they want to be in the thick of everything. They are also a very active cat with a high energy level, and not suitable for small spaces. Most Abys have dog-like traits including a fondness for water, and a capacity for being leash trained. Of the shorthaired breeds, Abys have one of the softest voices.

Leeside Cattery has been involved with breeding Abys since 1989, and has been part of the cat fancy since the sixties. The cats are all kept in conditions as close to a normal home environment as possible so that they are well-socialized and out-going. Cats are limited to 6 or less adults at a time, and adults cats are placed as pets after we have produced what we need out of them. Breeding cats are selected for health and temperament, as well as their ability to meet the show standard. All incoming cats are tested for feline leukemia and feline immunodefiency virus, and quarantined for at least a month before being introduced to the resident cats. We do not use cats with luxating patellas for breeding and avoid cats with renal amyloidsis within 3 generations in their pedigrees. Kittens are sold at a minimum age of ten weeks, and after they have had at least two sets of vaccinations and a check up by our veterinarian. Female kittens are often older at the time of the sale because extra time is needed to assess their potential for the breeding program.

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I support the view and goals of: MERCY FOR ANIMALS and the WORLD WILDLIFE FUND

Photo courtesy of Diane Smith PHOTO AT ONE YEAR of OUR RUDDY FEMALE BORN OCTOBER 6, 1996 out of:      SEAWIND SPELLBOUND OF LEESIDE     X     CH LEESIDE REBEL ANGEL BORN OCT 6,1996 - HAPPY 19TH BIRTHDAY LEESIDE AND THE ANGELS SING Lovingly owned, by Diane and David Smith, of Lexington, Virginia, "Angel 2", as she is known, will be 19 years old on October 6, 2015. I had always hoped that we would breed from her, but that was not to be. She has had her DNA swabbed and submitted, by her owners, to Dr Leslie Lyons, and is part of the Feline Amyloidosis research being done, by Dr Leslie Lyons, University of Missouri, and Dr Maria Longeri, of the University in Milan. Please help with this study, and if you own, or have bred, any of the breeds involved, or outcrosses to them, take part with either control cats, or affected cats, and their close relatives. Donations are needed, but should be sent as assigned to be used for this specific study, as a lot of research, in different areas, goes on at any one time. Are we putting all our money into winning, with unhealthy cats, or investigating/following, the pedigrees of cats, including their relatives, and removing cats, who have, and pass on serious health problems? What is the reason, the cat fancy, world-wide, now seems to be about 10-15% of what it was, when I quit breeding, in 2004? Sadly, Angel 2 passed away quietly, in February 2016. Shelley Hlady, August 6,2015

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Please watch my website for recent updates in this research as they enter Stage 2 of obtaining samples. Shelley Hlady October 13, 2017 Phone calls preferred over emails: 604-795-7111

***************************************************************************************************** N.B. October 3rd/15: Regarding the following research, the info and what they are requesting keeps changing. I have no idea if they are accepting swab tests from control cats, or not, and their requests now seem unrealistic, expensive to do, and possibly impossible, due to medical tissue crossing borders. Please email both researchers and question this. Their emails are, for Dr. Lyons: (lyons@missouri.edu) and for Dr. Longeri in Milan: (maria.longeri@unimit.it). It seems to me, they are now severely restricting the gene pool and the areas that the samples will come from with these changes. To contact Dr Maria Longeri, DVM, PhD other than by email, mailing address for correspondence to: Universita degli Studi di Milano Dipartmento di Scienze Veterinarie e SantaniaPubblica Via Celoria, 10-20133 Milano , Italy Fax (39)02 503 180 30 Shelley Hlady *****************************************************************************************************

********************************************************************************************************** HELP WITH RESEARCH INTO FAMILIAL AMYLOIDOSIS IN ABYS AND SOMALIS, AND THE ORIENTAL/SIAMESE RELATED BREEDS: SINGAPURA; OCICAT; COLORPOINT SHORTHAIRS; BALINESE AND JAVANESE, AND LAST, BUT NOT LEAST, THE NEWER AUSTRALIAN MIST, AN ABY DERIVATIVE, WHICH APPEAR TO BE ON EVERY CONTINENT NOW. IF YOU THINK YOU HAVE ANY ACCIDENTAL OR INTENTIONAL OUTCROSSES TO OBTAIN NEW COLOURS OR BREEDS, WHICH MAY NOW BE HAVING PROBLEMS, BECAUSE OF THE BREEDS WHICH WERE INTRODUCED, YOU MAY INCLUDE SAMPLES FOR THESE CATS, WITH NECROPSY REPORTS AND/OR LAB SAMPLES IF AVAILABLE. PLEASE CONTACT THE RESEARCHERS, OR LAB ASSISTANT, AND SAY WHY YOU ARE SENDING IN SAMPLES, INCLUDING FIXED SAMPLES, NECROPSY REPORTS, ALONG WITH FORMS AND PEDIGREES. KEEP IN MIND, PROBLEMS CAN LEAVE NORTH AMERICA AND COME BACK SEVERAL GENERATIONS LATER, UNDER OTHER CATTERY NAMES, OR EVEN AN INCORRECT PEDIGREE. Contact Professor (felinegenome@missouri.edu) or phone the lab at 1 573 884 2287. This is Dr Leslie Lyons, and her lab assistant, Erica. Obtain the info, and get the forms and instructions. Please take part in providing mouth swabs, from cats 10 or older, for controls, to compare to cats that are dying, at an average, by 4 years of age, of FRA. It will cost you nothing, and will help them find the genetic components that differentiate the cats that were necropsied, having died with RA, and those that live a normal life span. Keep in mind, cats will likely die of some organ failure eventually, including nephritis, which can be caused by infections (also infecting heart et cetera); even such things as not having regularly dentistry, leading to gingivitis. (Also poisons such as antifreeze.) Cats can also die of tumours, benign and malignant, and we see more of this in cats over 13, given that the average life span of the cat has gone up greatly since we started to keep them inside, and their life expectancy increased greatly in the last 25 years. In addition, the Menu Food Scandal, of 2006-2007, killed many pets, even on Canadian medical diets, as these were being produced at the same Canadian plant, as well as the US plant. Both rice and wheat, in tinned and dry foods were affected,but we were not told for many months after the problem appeared. Test fed cats lived no more than 6 weeks, though dogs lived somewhat longer. I've been phoning many people who have older cats from me, only to find their number is not in service. We are trying to obtain info on littermates too, and the more info the better. Even if your cat has passed away, please contact me, (leesideaby@yahoo.ca) or the address on this website. I now have an unlisted phone number; I'd like yours. If your cat has a file, or the vet does, I'd like all the info, even about unrelated things related to health. If you don't have the pedigree, I do, as many may not have registered their cats from the blue slip given after they were spayed or neutered, or placed as alters after I had bred them. If you have your original health record form, that will help me get the pedigree together. I've had many happy surprises, with cats alive at 18 1/2 plus, but can't find everyone, as they've moved, changed numbers, et cetera. Anyone with cats from other breeders, or who know of other such Abys/Somalis, would you please direct people to my website to read the info, and preferably, have them contact University of Columbia, Veterinary College, Dr Lesley Lyons at for more info. (felinegenome@missouri.edu) PLEASE, IF YOU DO NOT HAVE THE PEDIGREE OF THE CAT(S) THAT YOU ARE SUBMITTING SWABS FOR, WRITE ON THE FORM THAT THEY HAVE PERMISSION TO CONTACT THE BREEDER, WHO CAN THEN SEND THEM THE CORRECT PEDIGREE. Please contact me if you have sent me swabs for this by emailing me at leesideaby@yahoo.ca. Thank you Waiting to hear from you !!! Shelley, May 2015 PET FOOD CAUTION- Regarding EVO/Innova pet foods. This is one of the foods I previously recommended. They were bought out by a major conglomerate in 2012. My local pet food store quit stocking it, after 3 recalls of product in 2013 alone. Although, I used to be able to say that tinned food was often better than the same company's dry foods, I can no longer do so. After the Menu Pet Food scandal of 2006-2007, I had to question recommending ANY specific pet food with great caution. Reading the bagged ingredients helps, but it isn't the whole story. And cats are not dogs, and should have three prime sources of protein in the first four ingredients, as they don't require carbohydrates at all. Even their dentition hasn't changed. Check out Veterinary schools like University of Calif. at Davis and Cornell Small Animal practice, to keep up to date. Shelley, July 2014 Thinking of getting in touch? Please don't send anything to me by Purolator, because they make one attempt to deliver it, and then nobody knows where the item is.

*********************************************************** FDA PET FOOD RECALLS The pet food recalls, and the lies told by Menu Foods, have affected many people and their pets. Even though Menu Foods only publicly admitted to problems, and started recalls of foods in late March 2007, we later found out that production lots going back to at least early December 2006 were known to be tainted with melamine. The CFO of Menu foods sold out half of his shares in the company a month before Menu Foods started recalls. In addition, having used MediCal Mature tinned food with Winnie, I did have contact with RCIF, who now owns the previously Canadian vet food company. According to RCIF, Menu Foods originally told them that none of the tainted wheat gluten went to Canada. They later admitted this was not true. (More on the RCIF website.) So if this was not true, what else was not true? How can you test foods when all of specific products lots are gone? Or when the pets have died months before? None of us will ever know the entire truth about this matter. I know vet clinics in the US were trying to track the increase in pet deaths from renal failure, especially cats, from the fall of 2006 on. Obviously, if an animal died suddenly and unexpectedly, before we knew what was happening, no tests would be run. For more info check out the USA FDA recall site, which stores info from the most recent backward. The FDA has news conference info, as well as the listed recall info. You can go to the Cornell University website and see their research about the melamine/cyanuric acid tainting of pet foods. Cornell also did the test feeding of some Menu products on cats. Cats were found to be more dramatically affected than dogs, because the PH level of their urine promoted rapid crystal formation. As of this writing, it is my understanding that animals may still have insoluble crystals on their kidneys because of foods that were fed. Individual animals may not have died because they were being fed a variety of dry and wet products, most of which were not affected. Some of my pet owners, both in the US and Canada, did use tainted/recalled foods. The Menu Food scandal is just one link in the chain. The degradation of pet foods in the last ten years has occurred as conglomerates have bought out smaller companies who have a strong consumer base. Because the formulae of products have changed as this has happened, I have removed all of my cat food recommendations from my website. One more thing. PLEASE do not feed the Iam's dry cat foods. P & G removed the taurine from it, with the exception of one hairball formula, about ten years ago. This is not a meat based food. You might as well feed the dry Fancy Feast. You are not getting the product you were getting ten years ago, and we will be back with the death of cats from cardiomyopathy, as we were in the late 80's again. Buy the product, not the hype. Shelley Hlady August 2007 ANNOUNCEMENT: CAT OR DOG EXPECTING? I am now available to help new breeders or private pet-owners with the whelping of litters. The area I can service includes Chilliwack, Abbotsford, Langley, Surrey and White Rock in BC. Rates charged will depend on general circumstances, location, time of day etc. Call and discuss this with me. My veterinarian would be willing to give a reference to anyone considering using this service and references from long-time owners of cats from me are available too. Please check out my page on Pet Care Counselling for more info on other areas I may be able to help with. Producing healthy litters starts long before the actual birthing process and the more you know and can plan ahead the easier your pets whelping experience will be. If you have a cat from us, we'd love to hear from you and see recent photos of your cat. ____________________________________________________________

 

      

The International Cat Association: www.tica.org

Cat Fanciers' Association: www.cfainc.org