For some of us, a common-or-garden Tom cat is not enough. We want quality feline company with a pedigree and the only way to guarantee that a cat is a purebreed is to contact one of the national cat associations or similar organisations in other countries.

To find a purebred cat, you may start with the Cat Fanciers Association. The CFA was created to maintain breed standards and to register litters as purebreds. The association also holds cat shows and judges them based on how closely they adhere to the standards. They recognize only 41 breeds of cats.

The breeder registers a litter of kittens with the Cat Fancier's Association. Then they have the option of deciding whether or not to allow the kitten to be bred. Only cats with a pin number on their registration forms will be eligible to have their kittens registered. This allows the breeders to continue to better their breeds. Once the litter is registered, each kitten will need to be individually registered by its new owner.

There are three categories of recognized cats. They are the Championship Class, the Provisional Class, and the Miscellaneous Class. Each bred that the CFA recognizes is in one of these groups. They must win first place in their breed and then their class before they can compete for the title of best in show.

The Championship Class are those cats who are established cat breeds. The breeds in the Provisional Class have been more recently established. They are still being watched to insure that they conform to the new breed standard. Finally, the one breed currently in the Miscellaneous Class is still having a breed standard created and cannot actually compete for the best in show title.

In Canada, you can register your cat in the Canadian Cat Association. This association was formed by Canadians who did not want to register their cats with an association in another country. There are other popular cat registries including the Traditional Cat Association, which supports original breed standards and does not uphold current trends that exaggerate breed characteristics, the Governing Council of the Cat Fancy, which is the United Kingdom's cat registry, and the Fdration Internationale Fline, which is the European cat registry.

All cats fit into one of two categories. They are either short hair or long haired. Short haired are breeds like the Abyssinian and British Shorthair. The long haired beads include Turkish Angora and Norwegian Forest Cats. The most popular of them all is the American Shorthair which has been in the US for over 300 years. They have been carefully bred for generations to develop characteristics that would appear in each kitten born. Others include the Siamese, the Rex, the Main Coon, the Ragdoll and the Persian.

Choosing a cat with a pedigree allows you to choose a cat that has the characteristics that you want it to have. They are no more affectionate than other cats but they can be a prized possession no matter what.