THE HISTORY OF BENGAL

"God created the cat so that man has the joy of caressing the tiger." (Joseph Merry) ... and Jean Mill created the cat of the Bengal so that the man has the joy to caress the leopard!

If only two names were to be retained in the history of Bengal, it would be:

JEAN MILL, the founder of the breed and American breeding reference MILLWOOD. "ALC" or CHAT LEOPARD OF ASIA, the small wild cat ancestor of bengal.

The Bengal cat is a slightly different breed. Unlike very old natural races such as Siamese, Norwegian or European, the Bengal cat has been "created by man" and is derived from an initial hybridization with a wild animal.

The hybrids between wild animals and domestic animals arouse great fascination: the beauty and power of the wild animal allied to the affectionate temperament and close to the man of the domestic animal ...

It is from this fascination for a surprising hybrid kitten that Bengal was born.

Hybrid cats with exotic charm, leaving no one indifferent, have one day to give birth to a race in their own right to the healthy and fertile individuals: "THE CHAT OF THE BENGAL".

THE YEARS 60: "KIN-KIN", THE FIRST HYBRID JEAN MILL WITH "KIN-KIN", HIS ALL FIRST HYBRID FEMALE

It all began in Arizona, USA, in 1961. Jean S. Mill, a young American geneticist passionate about felines, brought a leopard cat from Asia to Malaysia. It was in the 1960s, and the legislation on importing wildlife into the United States is not very strict. Jean is a native of the United States of America, and he decides to introduce a companion into his enclosure and opts for a male domestic cat (a black american shorthair).

Malaysia quickly takes affection for the newcomer and the cohabitation between the two animals goes well. Malaysia suffers less from his captivity, Jean is satisfied.

Some time later, in 1963, and to the general surprise, Malaysia gives birth ... two hybrid kittens! A male and a female, both with the beautiful stained dress and the same wild air as Malaysia.

Shortly after birth, the very young ALC mother will kill the male kitten of the litter but continue to raise the female normally as John will baptize "Kin Kin". Impressed by the beauty of Kin Kin, Jean, decides to mate with her father, seemingly the only male available at that time and gets two new kittens, also turgid and wild. The experience stops abruptly when a series of unfortunate accidents decimates the whole family.

It is mistakenly believed that Kin Kin gave birth to the first bengal line of the Millwood breeding (the future breeding of John), but it is false, his premature death and that of his cubs did not allow it, No current bengal can be a descendant of Kin Kin.

THE YEARS 80: THE BIRTH OF MILLWOOD MILLWOOD TORY OF DELHI AND 3 FEMALES F1, PENNYBACK, PRALINE AND RORSCHACH

Ten years later, a meeting with a fellow researcher, Dr. William Centerwall of Davis University in California, completely revives John's interest in hybrid cats. As part of his research project, Dr. Centerfall also brought a few Asian leopard cats from abroad to study their natural immunity against feline leukemia. Among other things, he crossed domestic cats to see if the kittens would also be naturally immunized and whether immunity could be transmitted genetically. It was established that no and the development by another team of researchers of a vaccine against leucosis definitively ends the research of Dr. Centerfall.

In 1980, having to place the last hybrids born of the program, eight females, the doctor proposes to entrust them to his friend Jean Mill, who knows the leopard cat of Asia and who has already had a small experiment with hybrids. He subsequently gave him five more cats from another breeding program.

John does not just take care of animals in captivity. She set up an experimental breeding farm in her home, with the aim of creating a new breed from her hybrid cats. The cats of this new breed sport the wild air of the ALC but keep the same sociable and confident temperament as the domestic cat.

In addition to the cats entrusted to him by the doctor, Jean will acquire Egyptian maus (a breed of muscular and fine domestic cats with naturally stained fur), orientals and Abyssinians, all fine and muscular cats, to carry out other Crosses with her female hybrid cats (males being sterile) to further "dilute" the wild genes and especially avoid consanguinity.

Unlike the first experiment with Kin-Kin, Jean, only mates breeders who are unrelated to each other and start on a healthy basis.

She will later introduce British shorthairs cats to retrieve the "silver" gene and the "blotched tabby" pattern to create black silver bengals and marble bengals (see DRESSING COLORS and DRESSES for more details).

She will call her experimental breeding "MILLWOOD". For the anecdote, the father of the next generation of F2 is MILLWOOD Tory of Delhi, a domestic cat found by John in India wandering in a zoo near the rhinoceros pen. The legend says that it was Tory who brought the breed its "glitter" (coat very shining and sparkling in the light) and its "rufus" (orange trap responsible for the dresses in warm tones).

JEAN MILL AND A BENGAL MILLWOOD NB:

Dr. Centerwall's hybrid cats were part of a very serious research project funded by the Department of Biology at DAVIS University to eradicate a deadly disease that was ravaging the cat populations at the time. The first hybrid kittens at the origin of the current bengals were not born for "aesthetic or pleasure" purposes. Chance has made these hybrid cats then crossed the path of a scientist fascinated by their beauty who later sought to make them domestic cats like the others, without fear or aggression towards man.

END OF THE YEARS 80: A NEW RACE IS NEED, "THE CHAT OF THE BENGAL"

MILLWOOD PENNY ANTE In 1986,

The breed is known throughout the world thanks to the beautiful female F2 "Penny Ante" (see photo) who participated in nearly 30 feline exhibitions and stunned the public with its beauty and its surpant look and never seen "cat- lépoard ". The "cat of the bengal" breed is then registered officially by the TICA in the category "new breed and color".

TICA does not choose the name "cat of the bengal" to have an exotic sound or by allusion to the "tiger of the bengal." The choice of the name of the race is very sensible and is simply the translation of "felis bengalensis" One of the latin names of the Asian leopard cat.

Like any new breed, the Bengal cat evolves from generations to new lines until 1991 when TICA finally recognizes bengal as an established breed and sets its standards (see STANDARD OF THE BREED).

1989: THE ARRIVAL OF BENGAL IN FRANCE LADY BENJI OF PETIT POUCET

Bengal made its appearance in France in 1989, Odile Caillard-Arnoux of the breeding of "Petit Poucet" has imported from the United States a female brown spotted tabby, MILLWOOD Lady Benji (photo), which gave birth to the first French litter Of bengals in 1993: 3 kittens named Iaka, Indira and Ibernatus.

TODAY ... INDIA & INCA Bengal is a very recent breed but now well established. The dresses that we find today are splendid and even spectacular. The current trend is to focus more on the "type" (head and morphology) that had somewhat been set aside in recent years for the benefit of the dress. Confirmed breeders offer more and more regular very beautiful bengals combining superb dress and wild type. At the level of the character, the present bengal has nothing more to do with the hybrids of the first generations. Bengals are perfectly domestic cats that have kept nothing of their jungle ancestor. It must be understood that the wild blood has been very diluted and that each bengal has more of the domestic cat than the wild cat. The bengal kittens well sociabilized will be unforgettable companions, intelligent, curious and very affectionate. In the United States where the race was born, Bengal is very popular, it is even today one of the most popular races. Bengal is also the third most represented race in England. In France, Bengal went from race almost unknown to the public in 2003, to the top 10 of the most popular breeds in 2007 by entering 8th place in front of the Siamese and ragdoll. Since 2009, the rise of the breed in France is only confirmed and the Bengal seems today promoted to a very beautiful future.