Bearcloud Maine Coon Cats: The Price of a Purebred

All breeders know the situation: the phone rings; somebody is interested in a kitten. You talk back and forth with the potential buyer, and then the subject of cost is brought up. You mention your price, and the potential buyer inhales sharply and audibly - gasp! "This is not at all what I expected" or "Are all breeders that expensive?" or "Don't you have one without papers?" are common responses. Some people will be downright rude and call you all kinds of names before hanging up. Others will listen, and then call back later when they have had time to think it over.

If you want a purebred, but feel that the kittens are too expensive, try if you can find an adult neuter for sale. Sometimes breeders will sell former show or breeding cats, and these are usually less expensive than kittens. Another advantage of getting an adult cat is that you know that what you see is what you get, both in terms of looks and personality. If an adult purebred is also out reach for you financially, we recommend that you visit a shelter and rescue a cat. Cats from reputable shelters are vet checked, wormed, vaccinated and often neutered, and the price is symbolic. Whatever you choose to do, never buy a "purebred" cat without registration papers! Breeders who are not registered are commonly referred to as Backyard Breeders (BYB's), and these people are usually trying to make money by cutting every possible corner. The sad fact is that if you buy such a cat, you will have no guarantees and no place to file a complaint should the cat be ill. The "purebreds" sold by BYBs are nothing more than very expensive household pets, and often they will cost you a lot in both vet bills and heartache.

Cozy Farm Paradox, torbie Maine Coon kitten Breeding pedigreed cats is an expensive hobby. I personally don't know of any breeders who make money on breeding cats - on the contrary, most breeders are spending much more on their cats than they could ever hope to earn from selling kittens. Here at Bearcloud cattery, we charge from DKK 5000 for pet quality neutered kittens. Show/breeder quality kittens are priced from DKK 8-10000. Prices are usually higher for animals going abroad, because of the prolonged stay with the breeder, the extra shots and the extra paperwork associated with exporting. And of course, shipping and carrier must also be added to the price, if the cat is to be shipped to its new owner.

To the unexperienced kitten buyer, this may sound as a lot of money. But you have to keep in mind some of the expenses the breeder has had to raise this litter:

First of all, the breeder has to aquire breeding stock. A good show/breeder quality cat will cost you anywhere from DKK 7500 to DKK 25000, depending on where it comes from. Many breeders will import breeding stock from abroad to get new bloodlines, and this is generally much more expensive than buying a cat in your own country.
The daily maintenance with food and litter costs about DKK 7-10 per cat per day. This means that even in a relatively small cattery like ours, basic daily maintenance costs us a lot per month.
Necessary supplies will also cost you money. Cat carriers, scratching posts, food and water bowls, litter pans, grooming equipment, medications and so on. And these supplie s won't last forever, they will need to be replaced from time to time.
Vet bills cost a lot. All cats need to be checked by a veterinarian and have booster shots once a year. Some breeders also test their cats for various inherited diseases, and then there are always extra expenses - cats that get sick or injured, usually not in the vet's business hours. I have had a cat falling off the top shelf of the cat tree in her sleep and injuring herself - on Sunday morning, of course. Admittedly, she was not the brightest cat in the household...
Serious breeders will show their cats on a regular basis - entry fees are usually around DKK 230 per cat per show day. Add gas, hotel stays, ferry tickets or bridge tolls, and a one-week-end show trip will quickly cost you DKK 3000-4000, or more if you are going far or going to a fly-to show.
Stud fees must also be paid if you choose to have your girl mated by someone else's male. The prices vary a lot, some stud owners have a fixed fee, others will charge a certain amount of money per kitten born. Around DKK 5000 is not unusual for a mating, and prices may well be higher. Add to this the travel expences of your female and yourself, and a single mating can cost you as much as DKK 10000 - yes, we paid this much once, and yes, we feel it was well worth it.

All in all, most breeders spend a lot of money breeding cats. Here at Bearcloud cattery, we started out with a show alter, then another show alter, and then aquired our first female. I would recommend this to all others, as we learned a lot from showing our alters before we started breeding, and we made invaluable contacts to other breeders. But of course, we also spent a lot of money: when we got our first female, I calculated how much money we had spent thus far, because I felt that now that we were to become "a cattery", I needed to keep proper records. So I added up the amounts for aquiring the cats, aquiring supplies, vet bills thus far, show fees thus far, membership dues and magazine subscriptions, and estimated the cost of food and litter thus far. The result... well, it wasn't exactly uplifting, and I have stopped keeping financial records ever since. I don't really need to know how much money I have spent, or what I could have had instead of my cats - my husband might get second thoughts, if he ever knew about it...