“There are no ordinary cats.” — Colette – cat quotes. And this is no ordinary cat photograph. However, for Helmi Flick it is all in a day’s work and one of many thousands of outstanding cat photographs that she has taken. The kittens are pretty stunning too.

Sturdy bones, a solid body and a heavy double coat tells us that the Norwegian Forest Cat (NFC or in Norwegian: Skogkatt) is built for the Norwegian winter and comes from semi-feral stock many hundreds of years ago. American and British (primarily) breeders have refined the appearance but I hope not too much because the original NFC was superb.

The NFC shares these characteristics with the similar looking Siberian cat. And why not? Siberia is similar to Norway in respect of climate and habitat (for semi-feral cats).

The NFC also has long legs for jumping and climbing and this breed, in my opinion, is possibly the most adept climber and/or the most interested in climbing of all the breeds with possibly the exception of the Bengal cat.

My mind drifts to Norway. Are the Norwegians as keen on this cat breed as they are in America? This is a popular breed of cat being just outside the top ten most popular cat breeds from well over 70 breeds. Answer: probably not because in Norway the cat fancy is not so well developed. In general, they probably see cats more as domestic cats, random bred cats, than purebred.

Internet research indicates that there are fewer NFC breeders in Norway than Maine Coon breeders! I might be wrong but this is the impression I get. The NFC is more popular in the USA than in its country of origin. This cat is a great amabassador and export for Norway.

From Four Norwegian Forest Cat Kittens to Norgwegian Forest Cat