Written by Silvia Klaus,  ©2009   /  Translated by Karin Heger   /  Edited by Susan Wenck

 

When breeding, Ragdolls in particular, it is important to not believe everything that you hear. Always check your facts yourself before repeating them to others. Some facts are easy to research, if one shows a genuine interest in learning them.

 

A lot of Ragdoll breeders, especially the ones that are breeding for new color results, keep repeating the following myth:

“Everything originated from the queen Josephine.” They think that Josephine was the origin for the color red with the dilution crème, the 'tiger' patterned tabby (lynx), tortie, etc., the new eye colors of yellow and green, as well as for the Ragdoll without the point pattern.

And Josephine apparently had a great many offspring.

 

 

 

Denny Dayton founded his database on records from Ann Baker and the progeny from the initial pairings. Copies of these original recordings were also published in The Definitve Guide to Ragdolls, written by Lorna Wallance, Robin Pickering and David Pollard (1995).

 

Today there are several Ragdoll databases: RFCI, Pawpeds, and of course the original by Denny Dayton, from which a great deal of information was copied, at times with typographical errors.

Unfortunately, breeders tend to perpetuate the mistakes when copying information, which compound the common misconception that “everything originated from Josephine”.

 

Let's begin by clarifying some of these statements based upon recorded facts from the Denny Dayton documentation.

 

First, Ann Baker worked with two lines: The Light Side and The Dark Side.

That means that there were two founding queens, and both were important!

 

Progeny from Josephine:

 

In order to fully understand Josephine's offspring, the breeders should review the following and study the charts on the site

 “Founding Animals”. There is a lot of clarifying information.

 

We will begin with:      

The Light Side,  the first founding queen    Josephine.

 

According to Denny Dayton's database,     Josephine's mating in 1965  with Birman led to the creation of

     (1)  Daddy Warbuck  /     (2)  Gueber  /    (3)  Fugianna (a seal-mitted Ragdoll.)

 

These three animals represent all of Josephine's offspring, and only these three animals were the foundation of Ann Baker's Ragdoll breeding program - of Josephine!

 

Therefore, the actual queen of the The Light Side was    Fugianna.

Fugianna was then paired with 8 different studs, resulting in sixteen youngsters which in turn were used in Baker's breeding program.

 

On a side note, the documentation also informs us that Josephine belonged to a neighbor of Ann Baker. Ann Baker wanted to continue to use Josephine for her breeding program, however, the neighbor refused as they did not have a good neighborly relationship. Sometime around or before 1966/67 Josephine died. Apparently, she was shot by the neighbor.

 

Progeny from Burman:

 

The Dark Side, the second founding queen: Burman  (female!)

 

According to Denny Dayton's database, the female cat Burman was mated with Daddy Warbuck. The resulting offspring was a female seal colorpoint named Buckwheat.

Its's important to note that this one animal became part of the breeding program.

Buckwheat had blue eyes and the colorpoint pattern!

 

From the offspring that resulted from the back crossing of Buckwheat with her father and sire Daddy-Warbucks,

only two animals were kept: the male Kyoto and the female Tiki, a seal-colorpoint Ragdoll.

Buckwheat was then retired from the breeding program.

 

Therefore, the actual queen of The Dark Side was Tiki. She was paired with 7 different studs which resulted in 21 youngsters for the breeding program.

 

From the queens Tiki and Fugianna, the seal-colorpoint and seal-mitted Ragdoll types were fully stablished.

 

As you review the information above and study the charts on the subsite "Founding amimals", it is important that you question the origin of animals that are red or crème in color, 'tiger patterned' or are without the point-gen. As you will see, they cannot be traced to the queens Tiki and Fugianna.

Because the three animals from Josephine's progeny as well as Burman's kitten were seal (black) with either colorpoint or mitted. The litters of the next two generations were chocolate and bi-color.