Why add "domestic longhair" non-pedigreed cats to a Maine Coon pedigree? This is a question that is pretty easy to explain in words, which I will briefly do here. But....I will also post photos to show the purpose.

When you buy a kitten from a breeder, if you do not look at the pedigree first (most people have no interest in this), you may find a very high percentage of inbreeding. In our breed's past, we had a LOT of breeders who inbred, on purpose, for generation after generation, to get bigger and fancier looking cats. That meant better sales, but NOT better health or personality! Europeans were not the only ones to do this, but they did it the most. I sold most of my foundation line kittens to European breeders. These breeders were getting tiny litters or no litters, and you cannot keep this trend going if you are a breeder.

An F1 and F2 (if 100% fdn lines) are not big, nor are they 'typey'. But the job of the breeder (myself) is to see if they breed true in first litter. If kittens arrive that are not Maine Coon specific and healthy/happy, then that cat is done in a breeding program. DNA tests are run also, and only those who are negative/normal are kept to breed with. It is a gem of a cat who produces kittens nicer than herself, bigger than herself, and very Maine Coon looking right off the bat. (I saw "she" cause we never keep an early fdn male since they tend to spray).

For my example, I give you my F2 girl called TRESSA. She is brown mac torbie/white and small. I love her to pieces. She has had babies from many of our boys and every time, we got 4-5 babies, healthy and beautiful. I never keep F1 cats for more than a litter by the way, so I never talk about them. But if we get an F2 that is nice and produces well, we keep for many years/litters. CFF will register F3 babies, so so again, an F2 girl (ACA registered only) can then make F3 babies. TICA registers F4 and CFA registers F5. So here is Tressa, F2. and then her daughter TRUTI, smoke torti poly paw (from retired male Malachi). Already, a better quality girl and little bigger girl.

Then we bred Truti to a show line male we called Enoch (shell cameo normal paw). From that litter we kept an F4 girl called STORY. She is a shell cameo poly paw girl and medium sized. We then bred her to another show line male called Beau (blue smoke normal paw) and we kept the F5 girl EVA. (silver torbie poly paw). Now, you can see the show line quality and good size, and good personality plus good health. This is showing you why you breed with foundation lines.....