Looking for the perfect kitten(s)

My family had various pets growing up - bunnies, guinea pigs, hamsters, chinchillas. We never had cats even though I wanted a “Sheba cat” more than anything in the world. My mom thought cats were creepy and too high-maintenance. The early 90’s Sheba commercials that I loved so much she thought were disgusting. Serving cat food on a plate when there are millions of starving people in the world? Yuck. Nevertheless, I continued dreaming about one day having a Sheba cat, i.e. a blue British Shorthair (BSH) cat.

Once I had my own apartment in my early 20’s, I decided it was time to make this dream a reality. I was pretty clueless about the process and had to do a lot of research. I learned that breeding British Shorthairs, or any pure-bred animals, is a heavily regulated thing in Switzerland. There were official directories with approved breeders. Most of them had been around for so long they didn’t even have websites. I made many phone calls looking for breeders that had blue BSH kittens coming. Many breeders had a long wait list or absurd prices that made no sense.

I finally met the perfect breeder “BKH vom Utigerhof” in early 2009 after a year of searching. They were an elderly couple that had a big farm house and owned many award-winning BSH cats. When I first visited, they didn’t have any blue kittens but they still had some Silver Shaded BSH kittens available. I fell in love with them! In Switzerland, most catteries will not sell you a cat unless you promise they will have a feline companion. I reserved one Silver Shaded kittens and added myself to the waitlist for the next blue kitten to become available.