Hypoallergenic?
The Siberian may be good with people with an allergy to cats. This is claimed by Kathy Wade. Kathy runs a very good and informative website. I don’t know her, but I would expect her to run her cattery well too. Visit her site and make some enquiries www.siberiancat.net . It would seem that in tests carried out in the USA fur samples had less Fel D1 flakes (cat dander, the allergen that produces the allergic reaction in some people). This would seem to be confirmed by others3or is this a circuitous argument (one person quoting from another etc.)? It isn’t just Kathy who says that this cat breed is at least to a degree hypoallergenic. There have been comments and quotes on this for about a decade3(as at 2009).
There is however no scientific evidence to support the claims of breeders and keepers of this cat who claim this (except for the above as far as I am aware). Update: in Dec 1999, an independent lab in Virginia Indoor Biotechnologies, 1216 Harris St, Charlottesville, VA 22903 performed some tests on hair samples from Siberian cats, an Abyssinian and random bred cat(s). The results indicated that the allergen Fel D1 was present to a high level on a neutered random bred male cat but less so for a Siberian cat. Here are the results5. Update: I have a page on the Neva Masquarade being hypoallergenic. Please click here to read it.
Breed or type of cat | Fel d 1 (µg/g) |
A male neutered, random bred cat | 62,813 |
A male neutered, Siberian cat | 2001 |
A female, Abyssianian, neutered cat | 385 |
A female neutered, Siberian cat | 206 |
But please note that Kate Stryker says that this breed is hypoallergenic – see this post: Cats without undercoats are not hypoallergenic.
Associated pages:
Absolutely- how fun!