About Burmillas
This breed combines the lush beauty of the Chinchilla Persian with the clever and friendly personality of the Burmese.
The semi-longhair coat requires little grooming effort, while giving the cat a soft yet elegant style. The large expressive green eyes, with the eyeliner reflecting their coat colour are irresistible.
Miss Fuji showing off her beautiful green eyes
Because the Burmilla breed was developed using Burmese lines the result is an athletic, intelligent cat; very inquisitive and interested in what its people are doing – yet the Chinchilla Persian lines give it a more substantial build and quieter nature.
You won't find your Burmilla crying for attention or demanding to be cuddled constantly – but you may find that you have a constant shadow, who likes to be involved in everything that you do – and loves a lap the minute you sit down, especially in the colder months!
The Burmilla, is ‘a very white cat' to quote Don Burke. The coat comes in three different patterns, and five colours – but the base colour of the coat is usually a clear white or ‘silver'.
The coat pattern called smoke gives the impression of a solid colour . The shaded pattern has a layer of colour to 25% of the hair length. Tipped coats have only a faint tip on 5% of the strand. Most kittens from our cattery will be the tipped to lightly shaded variety.
Ideally this should be a very even mantle of colour over the body, excepting the legs and some markings on the face. These patterns can all be found in black, brown, blue, chocolate and lilac, with black and brown being the most common. The standards in some associations allow for the red and tortoiseshell colouring. At this stage, we are producing mostly black, brown and chocolate shaded kittens. We do have the capabability to produce blue and lilac shaded kittens but these kittens are still very rare in our breeding program.
Kittens are frequently dark when born, particularly if they have the shaded coat pattern - they lighten up as they grow. See your kitten news page for photos of our very young kittens.
The Burmilla Breed History
The longhair Burmilla, sometimes known as the Tiffanie (in Europe) was developed from the Burmilla shorthair breeding program. These semi-longhair kittens occurred in the Burmilla litters - undesirable for shorthair Burmilla breeding but so beautiful in their own right that in the late 1990's a group of NSW breeders applied for permission to develop the breed ... and the Australian Tiffanie's story began.
Although some of our Longhair Burmillas do have Australian Tiffanie ancestors. Longhair Burmillas are true semi-longhair cats so they do not have the long cottony Persian coat type like the Australian Tiffanies. Accordingly only Longhair Burmillas that display the correct sleek semi-longhair coat are kept for our breeding program to minimise coat matting issues. A true seim-longhair Longhair Burmilla only requires a good brush once week to stay elegant and beautiful.
Although Momo was a Gold Double Grand Champion of his time, he actually no longer represents the current Longhair Burmilla standards. Both of Momo's dad and mum were Australian Tiffanies, hence Momo has a very heavy Persian style cottony coat. He does matt quite a lot despite of regular grooming. However, he does have a beautiful temperament and we love him to bits.
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Dinky (along with all our other breeding cats) has the perfect semi-longhair coat that we look for in a Longhair Burmilla. His coat is silky and beautiful and does not matt at all even if we forget to give him his weekly brush. His coat is sleek and close lying to the body. He does not shed half as much as Momo and is very easy to groom. Of course he too has a beautiful temperament like Momo. |
A tight control is kept on the breeding programme to ensure that not only the appearance but the health of the breed is paramount.
We at Aaralyn Burmillas are dedicated to the Burmilla breed, hence we spend a large amount of time studying the genetics of our cats. All our breeding cats have been DNA tested for colour mapping and diseases identification. Breeding is a scientific process. We believe in informed breeding and not breeding by chance.
Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD) is an inherited autosomal dominant disorder affecting approximately 36% of Persian cats. Characterized by the formation of cysts on the kidneys, PKD could lead to eventual renal failure and possible death. Since the Burmillas were originally created by crossing Burmese with Chinchilla Persian, PKD could be passed on from the Chinchilla parent. As a result, a good breeder will always screen their breeding cats for PKD. DNA PKD testing is the only sure way to know if your cat carries the PKD gene. Accordingly, all our foundation breeding stock, even our pet cats have been DNA tested and are PKD negative.
Burmillas are very smart cats and most of them can be clicker trained. See Dinky's clicker training video here:
We have also had cats that love to fetch. They literally go and pick up the toy and bring it straight back to you like a puppy. Below is a photo of Momo he loves his ugly duckling toy.
Burmillas are also very friendly cats and will get on with most other cat breed. With proper introductions, Burmillas are suitable for mutil cat/ dog households.
Contact Isabella: isabella(at)burmillas.com
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