Bengal Longhair Cats

The Bengal cat is well known. There are other types of the Bengal cat, not yet formally recognized by the NZCF and other registering bodies. These are:

The Cashmere cat and the Pardino cat.
The Pardino is recognized by a cat association called European Group Judge Organization. This group's standard for the Pardino follows TICA standard, that is the same standard only the hair is semi-long. The organization allows the color blue. They also say that the Pardino (and therefore the Bengal cat) is different to any other domestic cat. This probably alludes to the behavioral characteristics described above.

The Cashmere cat is a long haired Bengal cat.
Is the hair of the Cashmere cat longer than the Pardino cat? The informal breed standard states that the Cashmere cat has medium length hair. The texture should be dense, soft and luxurious. The longer length coat (the Bengal's coat is quite short and tight to the body) comes from a recessive gene introduced in the early days of development when the Bengal were cross bred with mixed breed cats, Egyptian Mau (shorthair), and Himalayan cats (these are pointed Persian cats and therefore long haired). The long haired gene may have also come from the recessive long haired gene in the Abyssinian cat; a long haired Abyssinian is the recognized breed - the Somali.

There have also been alleged crosses the Bengal cat and American Bobcats to produce a wildcat hybrid (with a short tail?). Also Bengals mating with the American Lynx is alleged.

A cat called the Pantherette is founded upon the melanistic Bengal cat. This is a black Bengal cat that has black-on-black markings. It can occur when both parents carry the recessive gene for melanistic black. Black Bengal cats just happen sometimes, I expect very rarely.

Finally, in addition there have been Bengal variants in respect of color. The variant-colors are blue on apricot, chocolate, cinnamon and tortoiseshell, black and Tonkinese colored Bengal cats. Established Bengal cat breeders are not very happy about this, but....

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