I have a six month old male MC and he weighs about 7 lbs. Is this an average weight for this type of breed at this age?

-- Anonymous, November 03, 1998

Answers

It really does depend on the line (or to put it another way, it depends on your kitten's expected weight at maturity).

With my cats, I'm happy with anything over a pound a month, up to six months or so. Between six and eight months they get gangly; the next several months they spend playing catch-up and tag with their own body parts ;-), somewhere around 2 to 3 years they start to look like adults.

Maine Coon males can mature at anywhere from 12 to 20 pounds; females anywhere from 7 to 16. Exceptional individuals may fall outside this range; "It just depends".

Regards,

Ambar

-- Anonymous, December 31, 1998

We have a beautiful shaded silver whole male Maine Coon. He's not yet 6 months old (born 4-22-99). He currently weighs 11.5 lbs. He's not a bit fat, in fact, he looks too thin. He's very long and tall with the longest, bushiest tail I've ever seen. Also has hugh ears and feet.

I took him to the vet 4 weeks ago and he weighed 9.5 lbs. I wanted to see about getting him neutered. The vet checked him and remarked that he was going to be a VERY BIG cat, however, his testies had not dropped so he couldn't be neutered yet. He thought maybe in another 2 to 3 months.

From what I've read and heard, the silver Maine Coons don't get as big as the brown's but, I think I may have the exception. His father was very large and his mother was about average 11 to 12 lbs. Once neutered, am I going to have a monster? He sure is personality wise. Shadow gets into all kinds of things and has a great time picking up his crunchies with his paw and tossing them onto the floor so he can chase them before eating them. Last weekend he pushed the whole bowl off the counter and had lots of fun chasing them all. I let the dog in to help clean up the mess. He also pushed his empty food plate onto the floor and broke it. He's just like a little kid. We're crazy about him; he's so funny when he talks back. Sometimes he just opens his mouth real wide and no sound comes out. I think he's smiling, especially when he does something bad and I scold him.

Anyone else with a slow maturing male that had to wait to be neutered until he was 7 or 8 months old? Is this uncommon? It doesn't seem to have any effect on his growth so far.

Linda

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999