SCOTTISH FOLD
Place and time of origin: Scotland, 1961

• BREED ACCEPTED BY: ACF, WCF (only SH), ÑFÀ, TICA, ÀÑFÀ
• GROUP: Longhair, Shorthair
• PERSONALITY: The Scottish Fold, an amalgam of other breeds, draws the heritable part of its personality from those breeds: the British and American shorthairs, principally, with a touch of Exotic Shorthair and. None of these breeds is especially active. All are placid and calm and, with the possible exception of the British Shorthair, usually agreeable to extended handling. Thus, the Fold has evolved as a sweet-tempered cat: devoted but not demanding; bouncy on occasion, but never too boisterous; more likely to charm than to challenge; displaying a British sense of decorum leavened by an American sense of self-confidence.
• RECOMMENDED FOR: Families with children, spending the most time outside of home

One day in 1961 near the Scottish village of Coupar Angus, a shepherd named William Ross paused to look at a white cat playing in a neighbor's yard. The cat had caught the middle-aged shepherd's eye because her ears were folded demurely downward. William gave her name Susie.

The Rosses had discovered, that Folds' ears look normal, that is, pasted flat to the head, at birth. After 15 to 25 days, on the average, when the cartilage in normal kittens' ears is beginning to harden, causing them to stand upright, Folds' ears begin developing the crimp that produces their distinctive signature.

Folds were carrying a longhair gene. Though Susie produced but one litter and both the kittens in it were shorthairs, Snooks and her descendants produced longhaired kittens. Therefore, Snooks must have been carrying a longhair gene, which she had inherited from one of her parents.

Body Middle size, rounded, flexible

Neck short

Head well rounded, prominent cheeks

Coat dense, plush, even. Short to medium-short in length

Ears Small, fold forward and downward.

Eyes wide open with a sweet expression. Large, well rounded

Tail medium to long, flexible

Legs short, coarse

Paws neat and well rounded

Breeders in the United States used several shorthaired breeds in developing the Scottish Fold because mating one fold-eared cat to another often produced kittens with skeletal anomalies. Consequently, Exotic Shorthairs, a Burmese or two, and even the occasional Persians can be found among the topmost branches in the family trees of many Scottish Folds. Furthermore, when Folds obtained registration status in the United States, one association allowed breeders to outcross to Exotic Shorthairs for a brief time. Eventually, the approved outcrosses for Scottish Folds were limited to British and American shorthairs.