Brazilian Shorthair Cat

History: From Portuguese Ships to Studbook Entries

Cats reached South America together with the Europeans. On board they were not kept for their looks: cargo and ships' stores had to be protected from rodents, and a cat was part of the ship's equipment just as much as a water barrel. Once landed in the ports, these animals did not disappear — they spread through the cities and began to live on their own, breeding without any human selection at all. Over a few centuries a large free-living population thus formed in Brazil, very uniform in appearance: short-haired, medium-sized, with a wedge-shaped head and a long body.

It was this uniformity that the Brazilian engineer Paulo Samuel Ruschi noticed in the 1980s. The idea was untypical for felinology: not to create a new breed by crossing, but to describe an already existing natural type and fix it in documents — exactly as the British had once done with the street cat of the British Isles, and the Americans with their own. Ruschi set about it in 1985 and founded the country's first feline federation and the first cat club in Rio de Janeiro; it is from this structure that the history of the breed as a registered breed begins.

The decisive stage came in 1998: the World Cat Federation — an international felinological organisation headquartered in Germany — granted the Brazilian Shorthair the status of a recognised breed. That made it the first Brazilian cat breed with international recognition. The standard version the WCF publishes on its own site is dated 1 January 2010 and carries the code BSH.

It is worth grasping the exact scale of that recognition. The breed is in the WCF register — and there the international list ends: it is not in the breed list of the FIFe (37 breeds), not in that of TICA (over 80 entries), and not in that of the CFA. In other words, when you see an advertisement for a "Brazilian Shorthair kitten with papers", the only system in which those papers can be genuine breed papers is the WCF and the clubs that work with it. In Brazil itself, two organisations are full members of the WCF: CFB — Confederação de Felinos do Brasil (Magé, Rio de Janeiro state) and Tropicats — Federação Felina Sul-Americana (Rio de Janeiro).

One more detail worth keeping in mind when reading documents. The letters BSH in the WCF system mean Brazilian Shorthair, while the WCF codes the British Shorthair as BRI. At the FIFe it is the other way round: there BSH is precisely the British Shorthair. Three identical letters in a pedigree can mean two different breeds depending on whose form you are holding, so what you should look at is the name of the organisation in the header, not the code alone.

What the Brazilian Shorthair Cat Looks Like: The Standard Line by Line

What follows is a rendering of the WCF standard in force (version of 1 January 2010). It is a short, one-page document, and almost every line of it can be checked on a living cat.

Body, Limbs, Neck

The body is medium-sized and muscular — but slim and elegant. That pair of words matters: the standard deliberately keeps the breed halfway between the massive and the elongated types, so neither the cobbiness of the British nor the fine bone of the Oriental is the aim here. The legs are of medium length, the paw pads slightly rounded. The neck is firm but without pronounced musculature — the standard states this in a separate sentence. Another handsome short-haired breed you might be interested in is the Bombay cat.

Tail

Medium to long, not broad at the base, tapering slightly towards the tip. This is worth noting, because popular descriptions of the breed often say the opposite — "thick at the base". The standard itself says otherwise.

Head and Ears

The head is small to medium, of a moderate wedge shape, longer than it is wide. The profile is slightly curved — not straight and without a sharp stop. The chin and lower jaw are firm. The ears are large: their height exceeds the width of the base, they are set high, and they carry tufts. Ear tufts on a short-haired breed are a detail most descriptions simply omit, although the standard spells it out in plain words.

Eyes

Here lies the commonest error in descriptions of the breed. The standard requires eyes that are large and round, set wide apart: the space between them should hold one and a half eye widths. The almond shape often attributed to the "Brazilian" does not match the standard. Eye colour must harmonise with coat colour. If you prefer a cat with a less intense gaze, the Australian Mist may be a suitable alternative.

Coat

Short, glossy, close-lying, silky to the touch, with no undercoat. The absence of an undercoat is not a cosmetic detail: it is precisely what determines both the minimal grooming and the fact that such a cat holds heat less well than a double-coated breed.

Colours

Recognised are all colours and patterns except the pointed ones. White is allowed in any amount — from a single spot to an almost entirely white cat. So the only genuine restriction is the Siamese type of colouring with a dark mask and points; chocolate, lilac, cinnamon and other variants fall under no prohibition of the standard and are described by the general WCF list of colours. If you come across a text saying the opposite — that point is allowed but cinnamon is not — that is a rendering with an error in it, not the standard.

The Point Scale

Judges distribute 100 points as follows: body — 30, head and tail together — 35, eyes — 5, coat texture — 10, colour and pattern — 15, condition — 5. The greatest weight falls on the head-and-tail pair and on the body, that is, on proportions; colour and pattern, for all the breed's variety, count for half as much as the body.

A word apart about body mass. Reference works usually give a guide of 4–7 kg for an adult cat, and in everyday terms that is a reasonable range. It is worth knowing, however, that the WCF standard itself names no kilograms at all: it describes size in words. So a "breed weight norm" does not exist in the documentary sense — there is the norm of a particular animal, which the vet determines from its body condition.

The head of this breed has even made it into the anatomical literature: in 2016 a group from the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro published a comparative craniometry of the "Pelo Curto Brasileiro" and Siamese cats (Rocha et al., Revista Brasileira de Medicina Veterinária, 38, supplement 2). Thirty skulls were measured, fifteen in each group. Of the sex differences, the one that proved statistically significant was in the Siamese: there the males had a greater skull length and muzzle width than the females.

Character: Independent, but Attached

Breeds that grew out of street populations usually do not produce sharp characters: in a city, natural selection washes out the extremes in both directions — excessive timidity and excessive aggression alike. The "Brazilian" is a typical case of this logic. Descriptions of the breed agree on several traits: it is active, agile, very people-oriented and learns easily; while keeping the self-reliance of a street cat and choosing the moment for affection itself.

• Sociability: high. It attaches itself not to one person but to everyone it lives with; it usually gets on fine with children and dogs.
• Need for attention: high — and this is the main caveat. Portuguese-language descriptions of the breed warn plainly: if these needs are not met, the cat becomes irritable or withdrawn.
• Hunting instinct: retained and pronounced. This is the descendant of a cat that was "hired" for centuries to deal with rodents.
• Adaptability: the breed is described as suited to both flat-dwelling and outdoor keeping. On the second option see the health section: there are numbers there worth seeing before you open the door to the yard.

Important! Long spells alone come hard to this cat. If you are out of the house for most of the day, the plan has to be thought out in advance: a second animal, vertical space, puzzle toys and compulsory joint play in the morning and the evening. "It's a cat, it will entertain itself" is a poor strategy for this breed.

Training and Socialisation

Descriptions of the breed in all sources agree on one thing: this cat is clever and learns fast. That is no reason to expect a circus routine from it — it is a reason to use training where it genuinely makes life easier for both of you.

• The carrier. The most useful skill of all. The carrier stands open in the room permanently, with something pleasant inside, and a treat "accidentally" falls into it now and then. A few weeks later the trip to the vet stops being a catastrophe.
• The harness. Accustom the cat gradually and from an early age: first putting it on without going out, then a few minutes indoors, then a quiet yard. The outdoors is safe only for a vaccinated cat treated against parasites, and only where there are no busy roads.
• The clicker. The cat works well for a marker and a treat. "Sit", "come here", "go to your place", a calm attitude to having paws and ears examined — all of this is learned in short two- or three-minute sessions.
• What not to do. Punishment and shouting do not work with a cat in principle: they do not extinguish the behaviour, they teach fear of the human. Unwanted behaviour is removed by changing the conditions — take away the temptation, give a permitted alternative, reinforce it.

Socialising a kitten is a window, not a permanent option. The WCF code requires kittens to be given up no earlier than 12 weeks, and that is not bureaucracy: the first months beside the mother and littermates shape how the cat will behave with people and animals for the rest of its life.

Pros and Cons of the Breed

• Pros:
  • Minimal coat care — a short coat with no undercoat, brushing once a week.
  • No extreme features. The standard encourages neither a shortened muzzle, nor folds, nor deformed ears or tail — that is, whole classes of problems typical of breeds with "accentuated" anatomy are absent.
  • Sociability and trainability — fits easily into a family with children and other animals.
  • The founding population is genetically diverse — this is measured, not proclaimed.
• Cons:
  • Needs daily attention and long play sessions; tolerates solitude badly.
  • Holds heat poorly — without an undercoat a cold room is uncomfortable for it.
  • A strong hunting instinct — not the best neighbour for small rodents and birds.
  • There are no breed medical data, and there are few catteries outside Brazil — so checking documents and tests falls to the buyer.

Caring for a Brazilian Shorthair Cat: Simple, Yet Regular

Coat

Since there is no undercoat, brushing here is a five-minute job: once a week with a natural bristle brush or a rubber grooming glove. In the moulting season (in a flat that is usually spring and autumn) — twice a week. Bathing as needed, not on a schedule: if the cat has got dirty or you are preparing it for a show. Frequent washing of a coat without undercoat improves nothing.

Eyes, Ears, Claws, Teeth

• Eyes: wipe with a separate lint-free cloth for each eye, moistened with saline. Constant discharge is a reason to see the vet, not to wipe more often.
• Ears: inspect every two weeks. Large ears with tufts ventilate well but also collect more dust and grass seeds during outings. A dark, adhesive deposit with an odour is not "wax" but a reason to check for ear mites.
• Claws: an active cat with a proper scratching post often needs no trimming at all — provide the post first. If you do trim, take off only the transparent tip without touching the pink quick.
• Teeth: dental and gum disease is one of the commonest reasons for veterinary visits in cats generally, and in a Brazilian study oral lesions even turned out to be associated with FIV carriage. Brushing several times a week and an annual mouth examination are the basic minimum.

Space and Activity

Every day, 30–40 minutes of interactive "hunting" — a wand toy, balls, a paper ball — plus verticality: shelves, a cat tree, a windowsill with a view. This is not a whim: in a cat whose hunting instinct is unspent, the energy will find an outlet either in play or in your curtains and plant pots. Hunting games are best ended with "prey": caught the toy, got a piece of food. Then the sequence "search — chase — catch — eat" closes, and the cat settles instead of staying wound up.