Maine Coons on Avito: how to tell a pedigree kitten from a cross-breed or a scam ad

On a classifieds site such as Avito, Russia's biggest, a real cattery and someone reselling other people's kittens look exactly the same. One photo, the word "papers", a phone number.

The site doesn't vet sellers: it puts you in touch and charges for it. The checking is up to you.

What to read in the ad itself

Serious catteries advertise on these sites too, so it's the details you need to look at.

Start with the name. A cattery has a prefix registered with a felinological system, such as Raksi Line*RU, and you can check it. "Murzik Maine Coon Cattery" with no registration is just words.

Then look at the age the kittens leave. "Ready to go at two months" settles the question at once: before twelve weeks a kitten isn't protected by its second vaccination and hasn't finished learning from its mother.

If one seller has kittens from five litters listed at once, all year round, that's a production line. A price well below everyone else's should also ring alarm bells: the savings usually come from the papers or the parents' health tests, and you'll feel the second a few years later.

What the photos tell you

A bad sign: the same kitten in every photo, shot from different angles but always against a plain background. A breeder's kittens are photographed at home, in different corners, with their mother and their littermates.

Run the picture through a reverse image search. Photos downloaded from other catteries' websites turn up often, and a search finds them in a minute.

If there are no photos of the parents, ask the seller why. A cattery shows the mother and father, because when you visit you should be able to recognise them in person.

What to ask before you meet

Three questions weed out almost everyone.

Which system is the cattery registered with, and what's its number? A breeder will answer straight away, whether it's WCF, FIFe or TICA.

Which club registered the litter? Call that club and give the kitten's date of birth, sex and colour, along with the parents' names. The club will either confirm it or not.

Can I see the parents' tests for HCM, PKdef and SMA? Being told they're all healthy doesn't count: you need numbered documents.

And meet only at the breeder's home. "Let's meet at the metro station, it's easier for you" means you won't be shown how the cats live.

The scams people fall for most often

A reservation deposit with no contract and no meeting. The money's gone, and so is the seller.

Delivery of a kitten to another city, paid in advance. Even without any fraud it's a bad idea: the kitten travels halfway across the country in a luggage compartment to a stranger.

Papers that "we'll sort out and send later". A kitten leaves with its birth certificate in hand; if it doesn't, the litter hasn't been registered.

All three schemes lead to the same conclusion: don't send any money before you've met in person.

Our Maine Coon cattery is in St Petersburg, and all our breeding cats and their test results are on the website: see the Females and Males pages, and the kittens on the Kittens page. Follow our VK group (in Russian).

Home in Raksi Maine Coon cattery, St Petersburg.