The cat breed black with copper penny eyes is the Bombay cat. People search for this cat using the words in the title to this post so I thought I’d be another website that provides the answer.
I have a page on this cat breed so I won’t go over everything again. Click on this link to read about and see the Bombay cat.
I remember seeing Helmi Flick photograph a Bombay cat at a cat show (see my photo above under Helmi’s). The remarkable feature of this cat is the jet black coat. You’d have thought that all black coats are the same, more or less. Black is black after all. But the Bombay’s black coat has a sheen to it: patent leather sheen, which is the breeder’s objective. I don’t know how they achieve it. Perhaps the breeder just polishes the cat up for Helmi’s camera 😉
I am sure the coat requires regular grooming to keep it shiny.
Another titbit of information is that this cat is very tricky to photograph with autofocus because the black coat doesn’t provide a point upon which the camera can focus.
Perhaps it was quite brave of cat breeders to create a black cat breed. Black is not a popular cat colour. The Bombay is not that popular, in fact.
My feelings are that it is a little bit too heavily bred. The round eyes look unnatural. This is the Burmese inheritance I believe and being linked to the Burmese it may inherit the genetic health problems associated with the American Burmese: Burmese craniofacial defect.
This cat breed was created in America at a time when the greatest number of new cat breeds were being created and also at a time when the interest in wild cat hybrids was beginning. The Bombay is an all-domestic cat but it is meant to be a miniature black panther in the home.
What about harmonising appearance? 😉 There is a wide variation in the Siamese and Persian, two very important cat breeds.
The World Cat Federation has harmonised names (and the spread of TICA has done likewise). Black Self Asian is simply an alternative term, in the same way that Himalayan and Colourpoint Persian Longhair are alternative names.
European Bombay and American Bombay tend to be used to distinguish between the 2 different conformations where required. Alternative names are useful when cats are imported/exported as outcrosses for breeding programmes as the knowledgable breeder can see where a cat originates from.
There is probably a similarity in terms of pushing the limits of breeding.
Beautiful cat but wouldn’t want one myself. The more I look at the face the more it reminds me of a Chihuahua. I know that sounds odd because its a cat but its just the big round eyes small muzzle and big ears!!