My journey to the Ocicat
My name is Marlies Heynemans and I live in the south-east of the Netherlands. I work in healthcare and have several hobbies.
Nature and animals have always played a big part in my life and I grew up with lots of animals. We always had a dog, rabbits, turtuls and fish and a regular supply of new pets that were abandoned or found their way to us in another way. Saturday was the usual day for me to visit my Uncle’s farm, where i enjoyed riding the ponies and helped clearing stables and taking care of the goats and birds. Feeding young lambs was also always enjoyable. I also had my own garden in my father’s vegetable patch. Gardening is still a favourite past time.
While I was studying to become a nurme I was not able to keep pets and as soon as I could I took in 2 rabbits and 2 female cats. One of the cats turned out to be pregnant and I suddenly had kittens as well. 2 of the male kittens stayed and when I moved to a place near some paddocks I was able to let them roam. After some time one of the them had a planned litter of kittens and I kept Casper the cat. This was some time ago and the female cats reached an age of 12 years, but the males lived to 19 years.
Because I wanted to have 5 cats I had to cat proof my garden so as to not burden my neighbours. The garden is completely ocicat proof, so there is no escaping.
As I possibly wanted to breed, I looked around for a breed that i felt afinity with and was genetically strong. Also the appearance and character was very important. After reading several books and visiting cat shows I was left with two possibilities, the ocicat and the abessynian. I got in touch with Bertie and Aldert Ottens of the Oci van Diem Cattery and the more I heard about the ocicat the more this breed attracted me.
I now have 3 ocicats and 1 moggy. You can read more about them by clicking on the links.
Thanks to Bertie and Aldert, I now have the beautiful ocicat female Prinses Lucie Oci van Diem.
The catteryname 'Draga Pisicâ' means precious in Romanian. Romania has a special place in my heart because I worked there just after the revolution in a red cross childrenshome. A moving experience of which I cherish the memories and an fondness of the Romanian language.