“I love cats who keep their baby faces and gorgeous stripes, so I researched and found that they are called American Shorthairs,” said Blair Hoffman, a client of City Cat Doctor. Here is her full story of how she came to find her beautiful kitten, Pinocchio.

“Living in Chicago, I looked for a breeder who was in the Midwest. I found several, so I started looking at Web sites and was instantly smitten with the Steadam Cattery in Michigan (www.steadamcats.com)

I learned that her philosophy is to integrate the kittens into the household immediately so that they are used to human hands from birth and are gentle, sweet, good with children and other animals, even birds!

Her cats are stunning, and I began emailing her to learn how often she bred her cats, which is every nine months, and if she doesn’t get a show quality kitten, she will spay the cat and place it for adoption in a loving home.

I asked whether they are treated as pets or just working for their food. They are show cats and breeding animals, but these cats live in this beautiful home and rotate between the cattery and the actual living quarters. There are alpha females and non alphas. This is how she rotates the females thru the house. Kittens have the run of the house at other times. Males have the run of the house under observation for birth control purposes. Breeding is intentional and controlled. She brings in other American Shorthairs to open up the gene pool and increase hybrid vigor
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There is not one cat hair in this house or one indication of cats in the house until you walk in the door and all of them begin to meander toward you. The cats are bathed to keep fur from gathering in the house, and the Board of Health doesn’t even visit any more because they have such a stellar record.

I asked her if all of her cats breed, and she said that many of her cats never breed; they show and then are spayed and adopted into loving homes.

The cattery is in their home in a neighborhood and from the outside, there is no indication that there is a cattery is inside.

I can’t recommend Dawn Skupin and Steadam Cattery highly enough!”
- Blair Hoffman