Our family has enjoyed the rewarding experience of living with Bengal cats for the past 21 years. We are passionate about the breed and proud to say we are a cage free environment. When you choose a Bengal kitten from Jemstones you can tell they have been heavily loved on!
Our goal is to produce premium quality bengals that have fabulous body and head type, defined rosetting with extreme contrast, well socialized with great temperaments. Our priority is ensuring all our kittens are placed in well-suited “forever homes”.
Life with a Bengal:
My daughter Hailey grew up with Bengals from the age of 7 and shares her insight on the breed. “Bengals are the smartest and most social cat breed. Their nature is a big personality! They love to play and are curious and quite dog-like. So smart. ..too smart for their own good”.
We’ve had some that like to play fetch and retrieve. We harness train ours and they go for walks. Ours can hear when one of our cars pulls into the driveway and will wait at the top of the stairs with our Great Danes to greet us when we walk in the door 🙂
They are also trainable and too smart for their own good! I taught one of ours before to sit. They also know and respond to boundaries and simple commands like… “out!” “get down” “No” “dont touch that” etc. They definitely understand when you talk to them and they love to be chatty and meow back when you talk to them as if they understand.
They do love exercise… we have cat wheels for them when its too cold or dark outside… they like to go for a saunter or full on run on them. They like it outside the best though… we have outdoor play areas and they like to sit below the hummingbird feeder and watch the hummingbirds lol. In the summer we set up a kiddie pool and they go in to play or just cool off in and then rip around in the grass.
Not lap cats??? Oh my gosh! Ours have always been cuddly. We do handle ours a lot when they are young though so perhaps they’re more so lap cats than others. They’re usually around for tv time on the couch with us. Ours especially likes to watch the tv screen haha, Bird channel is a big hit! Some of ours have slept with us at night in the bed under the covers with you or against you snuggling.
The best part of having a Bengal is having a great companion!
Our Males share spacious divided rooms where they each have individual running shelves, cat wheels and their own window with an active view of passing cars, walking pedestrians and birds and trees. The majority of each day is spent outside enjoying their outdoor play areas.
Our Females share rooms with running shelves, a cat wheel and a large window with an 18” ledge for laying on and looking out at the view of the trees, passing cars and pedestrians. They also enjoy a comfy double bed and their individual cuddler beds. The majority of their time is spent freely roaming the home at their leisure.
Our Nursery is located in a large area at the back of our master bedroom. All pregnancies are closely monitored and all deliveries are attended. Each birthing area is 4.5 feet x 6 feet and includes a large shelf and individual window with an 18” wide ledge for laying out and taking a break from babies and enjoying the view of the trees and yard and play areas.
We have a Nest Cam IQ camera installed in each birthing area for constant monitoring. It additionally provides a 24 hour live stream HD view via internet of all activity and sounds so we can continue to monitor from anywhere. The 2 way microphone allows us to talk to the moms so they can hear our voice for reassurance if needed.
Our Babies remain in the nursery until they are 5 weeks old. They are handled constantly from birth and by the age of 3 weeks are already butting their little heads against our hands when we rub their heads. At 5 weeks of age, we begin by taking them and their mothers to the designated sitting room/kitten room for short visits beginning no longer than an hour. Here they adapt to changes and are stimulated by a wide variety of new toys and experiences.
They also become very comfortable with crates as they are transported back and forth daily. By the age of 6 – 7 weeks they being spending their entire days from 7am to 10pm in our kitchen which is the centre of activity in our home. The mothers like to supervise and co-parent all kittens regardless of whose they are.
Our kitchen is partitioned with portable plastic interlocking panels to provide a smaller activity space of 4 feet x 16 feet to ensure successful litter box use. The space is loaded up with toys and activities to keep them stimulated. Once we have confirmed good litter box habits have been established, their activity space can then be expanded to the use of our entire kitchen.
Indoor Play Areas:
As kittens get older they begin to explore the rest of our home. Our living room includes a large feature wall with custom cat shelves and a 7 foot cat tree/activity centre. There is also a sitting room/kitten room filled with toys and a 7 foot cat tree/activity center that they love to play on.
Outdoor Play Areas:
These consist of 3 separate secure partially covered areas where our cats can use them all year long. They can climb, run and play on rustic shelving made from trees, lay out in the grass and enjoy the sunshine, watch birds, chase bugs and paddle around in their kiddie pool during the warmer weather. There are 2 four-way locking cat doors installed in our kitchen window with an overhead infrared heater just outside both doors for our cats to enjoy on cooler days. One door leads to a 20 foot cat tunnel out to a 10′ x 25′ play area. The second door leads to a partially covered secure 5′ x 16′ play area and there is also a partially covered outdoor play area designated for supervised kitten play which is 4′ x 12′ .
Nutrition:
At Jemstones we feed Canadian made food to all our cats and kittens. Acana dry foods and Now Fresh wet in the latest tetra packaging. Acana and Now Fresh both contain excellent quality ingredients that our cats all love with the added bonus of being reasonably priced compared to others.
Our babies are weaned with KMR kitten formula mixed with Royal Canin canned Mother & Babycat. Once they are eating well we remove the formula and begin adding in the Now Fresh wet chicken pate until they are 100% transitioned . They all love the smell and taste of Now Fresh. By 6 weeks we begin adding in the Acana First Feast dry food mixed with the Now Fresh Chicken pate.
All our breeding females are fed Acana Wild Prairie All Life Stages for optimum nutrition and when pregnant receive the addition of Now Fresh Chicken pate. Our males are fed Acana Wild Prairie and love the taste.
Litter:
We use World’s Best Cat Litter multiple cat clumping for all our cats and older kittens. This litter is terrific!! No smell, no dust, fantastic clumping properties and I can just flush it down the toilet. It is expensive but its worth it. We use Purina Yesterdays news litter for our babies. It is extremely safe and made from recycled paper. Its 99.7% dust free, comes in a pellet form, extremely absorbent and has great odour control.
