Clydesdale Horse

Family: Equidae
Description

     The modern Clydesdale stands at 16.2-18 hands high and has a straight facial profile and long legs with long, silky hair called "feathers." They have longer legs and more streamlined bodies than most draft breeds. Cow hocks are considered a feature of the Clydesdale breed, although it is often seen as poor conformation in horses.
     They are beautiful movers with a high stepping gait, which has made them popular as flashy carriage horses. The most common Clydesdale colors are bay, brown, black, chestnut, and roan. Clydesdale markings generally consist of a white stripe on the face or a bald face and white lower legs
Horse Care and Feeding

     The Clydesdales are large horses. They eat about twice as much as other horses, which is about 25 to 50 pounds of hay a day, plus about 5 pounds of concentrated feed if they are being exercised.
     Since Clydesdales are large horses, they need more room than other horses. A 24' x 24' stall is the minimum size a Clydesdale should be kept in as long as they are turned out into a paddock daily.

Horse Training and Activities

     The Clydesdale has a very pleasing disposition. It is proud, alert, intelligent and willing. They are commonly used for pulling carts or carriages.
     In the show ring, Clydesdales are shown in halter, cart, and hitch classes. They also make good riding horses and people use them for trail riding, jumping, and dressage. Their calm personalities make them a good horse for therapeutic riding programs that help disabled people learn to walk by feeling the movements of the horse's walking.

Common Health Problems

     "Scratches" or pododermititis are more prevalent in horses that are subjected to wet muddy conditions for extended periods. Horses with white feet seem also to be more susceptible to scratches.

Havana Brown Cat

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)
  Havana, Chestnut Brown, Chestnut Brown Foreign Shorthair, Berkshire Brown, Reading Brown, Oriental Chocolate Cat

Description
   The defining feature of the Havana Brown, as signified by its name, is of course its uniformly brown coat. Even the nose and whiskers are brown. All shades of chestnut brown are acceptable. The coat is medium in length, glossy, and smooth.
The body is medium in length and muscular, but not stocky. The legs are medium in length and the tail is medium long. In Britain, the Havana Brown has a more Siamese appearance than in the United States. In Britain, the head is triangle-shaped and the nose is long and straight. In the United States, the head is rounder in shape and the nose is shorter. In both countries, the ears are large and the eyes are oval-shaped and green. This breed weighs 6-10 pounds and lives to be approximately 9-15 years old.

Care and Feeding
  The Havana Brown is a hearty breed that has no special dietary needs. Unlike some breeds, the Havana Brown is able to digest milk.

Breeding/Reproduction
  Female Havana Browns are excellent mothers. Litters, on average consist of five kittens. The kittens open their eyes as early as the third day after birth.

Common Health Problems
  This is a naturally healthy breed. The Havana Brown is even known for having a natural immunity to upper respiratory infections.

Albino Cory / Armored Catfish

Family: Callichthyidae
Care and feeding:   Since they are omnivores, the Albino Cory will generally eat all kinds of live, fresh, and flake foods. To keep a good balance give them a high quality sinking pellet or flake food everyday. Feed brine shrimp (either live or frozen) or blood worms as a treat.
Distribution:   The Paleatus Cory are found in the La Plata river in southeast Brazil.
Size - Weight:   The Albino Cory get up to 2.5 inches (7 cm).
Acceptable Water Conditions:   Hardness: 2-25° dGH   Ph: 6.0 to 8.0   Temperature: 72-79° F (22-26° C)
Breeding/Reproduction:   The Corydorus have a very interesting breeding routine. After bumping the male on the vent, the female will receive the males sperm into her mouth. She then discharges a few eggs which she catches and clasps with her ventral fins. Then the female will swim around and deposit a bit of sperm and just a few eggs at a time in select spots, such as a strong plant, the heater tube or ever the aquarium glass. When she has runs out of sperm, she will go back to the male and repeat the process until the spawn is complete. See the description of how to breed these fish in Breeding Freshwater Fish

Sphynx Cats

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)
    Sphynx, Canadian Hairless Cat, the Moon Cat, the Wrinkled Cat, the Birthday Suit Cat, Chat sans Poils (French name)


Description
     The Sphynx is a medium-sized, elongated, muscular cat. The body is well-rounded and fully muscular. The back is slightly arched. The legs are in proportion with the body and well-muscled. The tail length is also proportionate with the body. It is slender, and tapering. The head is medium-sized, angular, and slightly triangular. The eyes are large, lemon-shaped, wide-set, and slightly slanted upward toward the ears, which are very large and wide-set. They live to be 10-15 years old and weigh 6-11 pounds.
The main defining feature of the Sphynx is, of course its coat, or lack there-of. The Sphynx is known as being hairless, but that is not completely true. It is covered in fine down, making it feel like a warm peach or suede fabric. Short, fine hair is sometimes present on the tail, feet, nose, and cheekbones. Wrinkled skin is desirable, but not excessively. The Sphynx is accepted in all color variations, which can be seen in the skin pigmentation and fine hair.


Care and Feeding
    The Sphynx eats a lot more than other cats of similar body size, in order to help regulate body temperature.


Breeding/Reproduction
    The average litter size for this breed is 4 kittens. Females have difficulties rearing kittens.

Balinese Cats

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)
    Balinese Cat, Oriental Longhair (Australia), Balinais (France), Balinesen (Germany), Longhaired Siamese (former name before they were called Balinese).


Description
     The Balinese has the same body type as the Siamese, except for its medium to long coat and plumed tail. It has a long, slender, medium-sized body. The head is a long, medium-sized tapering wedge shape. The eyes are almond shaped, medium-sized, and slant towards the nose. The ears are quite large, pointed, and wide at the base. The nose is long and straight. The neck, legs, and tail are long and slender like the rest of the body. It weighs 6 to 11 pounds.
    The coat length is medium to long. It is longer on the body, belly, and tail. The fur creates a plume on the tail, which is a prized characteristic of the Balinese. The coat is fine and silky, with no undercoat. The Balinese is accepted in the same colors as the Siamese. These colors include Seal Point, Chocolate Point, Blue Point, and Lilac Point. If they have other color point patterns, such as Red Point and Cream Point, they are known as Javanese. However, in the UK, this separation is not made, and all color points are considered to be Balinese.


Care and Feeding
    Balinese cats are not picky and require no special diet

Bengal Cats Bengal, Bengali

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)

    Bengal, Bengali

Background

     The creation of the Bengal breed began in 1963, when Jean Sugden, an American geneticist of Yuma, Arizona, crossed her female Asian Leopard Cat with a black short-haired domestic male in hopes of combining the wild physical characteristics of the Leopard Cat with the friendly disposition of the domestic cat. Though matings between domestic and wild cats usually produce only infertile offspring, the females from this cross were fertile. A female of this litter, named Kinkin, was bred with her father, and produced a litter of both plain and spotted kittens. This breeding project could have been the beginning of the Bengal breed, but it was abandoned after the second mating, when Mrs. Sugden was widowed. However, later in1973, another geneticist, Dr. Willard Centerwall of California, began a new breeding project with Leopard Cats and short-haired domestic cats in order to determine the Leapord Cat's resistance to feline leukemia. He gave eight females to Jean Sugden, now Jean Mill, after her remarriage, and she used them to start a new breeding program. 

    In 1983 the International Cat Association (TICA) accepted the first Bengal for registry. His name was "Millwood Finally Found". The Cat Fanciers' Association (CFA) currently does not recognize the Bengal. 

This breed's name was derived from the Asian Leopard Cat's scientific name, Felis bengalensis. It has no affiliation with the commonly known Bengal Tiger. Many different domestic breeds have been used in breeding programs for the Bengal, including the Siamese, Burmese, Egyptian Mau, Ocicat, Abyssinian, Bombay, and British Shorthair.

Care and Feeding

    The Bengal requires no special diet.

American Wirehair Cats

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)

    American Wirehair.

Background    The first known American Wirehair, named Adam, was born in 1966 on a farm in New York. The kitten was born to two straight-haired American Shorthair parents, Bootsie and Fluffy, and was the only wirehaired kitten in the litter. He was red and white. The wiry hair is caused by a mutation on a dominant gene. Adam was bred with a female straight-haired kitten from the same litter named Tip-Toe. They successfully produced wire-haired kittens, and by 1969, a true-breeding American Wirehair had emerged. In 1977 the Cat Fanciers' Association recognized it as an official breed. It is still an uncommon cat in the United States, but is a rare cat nearly anywhere else in the world.

Description

     The American Wirehair's defining feature is of course its wiry, springy fur that resembles the coat of a lamb. The wiry appearance is created by the fact that each hair is either curly or hooked. Unlike the American Shorthair, the American Wirehair's coat is of medium length. The hair is coarser on the head, flanks, and base of the tail, but is soft on the underbelly and chin. The coat can have any color form that the American Shorthair has, except for patched tabby. Some examples of acceptable colors include White, Cream, Shaded Silver, Black Smoke, Classic Tabby Pattern, Calico, and Blue-Cream.
Apart from its unique coat, the American Wirehair is similar to the American Shorthair in most other aspects. It is a medium to large cat and weighs from 8 to 15 pounds. It has a muscular body. The head is medium-sized, broad, and round. The eyes are large, round, and wide-set. It is highly desirable for it to have curly whiskers. The males are larger than the females and have defined jowls. This breed's approximate lifespan is 15 years.

Care and Feeding    This breed has no special dietary needs.

Devon Rex Cats (Pixie Cat, Alien Cat)

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)    Devon Rex, Pixie Cat, Alien Cat

Background    The Devon Rex line is believed to have descended from a stray tomcat that was seen around an old tin mine in Buckfastleigh in Devon. The cat appeared to have a curly coat which enticed various people to attempt to capture and breed him, but they were not successful. However, in 1960 the cat mated with another stray, a tortie-and-white, which reared a litter that included one curly-haired kitten. This kitten was named Kirlee by Miss Beryl Cox, a friend of the kittens mother. Kirlee is known as the father of the Devon Rex breed. At first, it was believed that these cats could be bred with the Cornish Rex breed, which was discovered ten years earlier. However, when they were bred together, only straight-haired kittens were produced, revealing that the two breeds were distinctive. It was also found that curly-haired kittens from the Devon Rex line could only be produced when both parents carried the recessive gene. The Devon Rex was recognized as a separate breed from the Cornish Rex in 1967, except in the United States, which waited until 1979 to distinguish the two breeds.

Description     Like the Cornish Rex, the Devon Rex is largely known for its unique wavy coat. The Devon Rex coat is comprised mostly of down hairs, but unlike the Cornish Rex, it has some guard hairs, though they are thinner than the average cat's guard hairs and vary in length. These features create a lumpier, slightly harsher coat than the Cornish Rex coat. Like the Cornish Rex, the Devon Rex also has curly eyebrows and whiskers. Interestingly, like young birds Devon Rex kittens molt their original coat, which is a very fine down coat, at around 8 weeks of age. The new coat can take from a few days to over a year to completely grow in.

    The Devon Rex is a small to medium-sized cat, weighing 6 to 9 pounds. It has a hard, muscular build and a slender body, though its chest is broad. The legs are slender, but strong. The hind legs are longer than the front legs and the front legs come out from the chest, giving it a bulldog pose. The tail is long and slender. The head is wedge-shaped with full cheeks, large, oval-shaped, large set eyes, a stop to the nose, creating a dip when seen from the profile, and extremely large, wide-set ears, giving it a "pixie" or "elfish" appearance. The lifespan for a Devon Rex is 9 to 15 years, though some have been known to reach 20 years of age.

Care and Feeding    Devon Rexes enjoy eating a lot, but they are not known for over-eating. No special diet is required.

Scottish Fold Cats (Pixie Cat, Alien Cat)

Family: Felidae

Common Name(s)    Scottish Fold
Description
     The defining feature of the Scottish Fold is, of course, the folded ears, caused by a spontaneous mutation from a dominant gene. They are folded forward and downward. Smaller, more tightly folded ears are desirable. Some have a single fold, while some have a double fold. The double fold causes the ear tips to almost touch the head. Kittens begin to exhibit the folded ear trait at about 25 days, when the cartilage in the ears begins to harden, and most kittens' ears stand up. These kittens' ears simply stay down.
    This is a medium-sized breed with a rounded, stocky body. The legs are medium in length and the tail is medium or long in length and tapering. The head is round and wide and sits on a short neck. The eyes are large, round, and wide open. The nose is short and softly curved. These features create an owl-like appearance. The Scottish Fold has a thick, double coat. All color combinations are accepted, except for chocolate, lavender, the Himalayan pattern, and any combinations of those colors with white. They generally weigh 6 to 13 pounds and live to be 10 to 15 years old.
Care and Feeding    They require no special diet.