• CFA calls the Maine Coon the largest of all pedigreed cats and says a mature male's weight not unusually reaches or exceeds 20 pounds (9.1 kg), with females usually smaller.
  • The breed is slow maturing and CFA allows up to three years to reach full growth, so a young cat has not finished growing into its type.
  • CFA's standard asks for a rectangular head with a visibly square, blunt ended muzzle and a gently concave profile between the two.
  • Large ears with prominent tufts, large round well tufted paws, and a heavy shaggy coat that is shorter at the shoulders and longer on the stomach and britches are all in the written standard.
  • Genome work on cats found that breeds were built by selecting specific mutations out of random bred populations, which is why unregistered cats regularly carry Maine Coon looking traits without Maine Coon ancestry.

What to look at

  1. Head outline first. CFA asks for a head medium in width and slightly longer than wide, reading as rectangular, not round and not wedge shaped.
  2. Muzzle. Visibly square, medium in length and blunt ended in profile, with a chin giving the impression of a square 90 degree angle. A tapering or pointed muzzle is against the standard.
  3. Ears. Large, wide at the base, tapering to appear pointed, and well tufted, set about one ear's width apart.
  4. Coat distribution. Heavy and shaggy, shorter on the shoulders and longer on the stomach and britches, with a frontal ruff desirable. An evenly short coat is penalized in the standard.
  5. Paws and tail. Paws large, round and well tufted, with five toes in front and four behind. The tail is long, wide at the base, tapering, with long flowing fur.
  6. Size, last and with patience. A mature male reaching or exceeding 20 pounds (9.1 kg) fits the standard, but so do plenty of large domestic longhairs, and the breed is not fully grown until about three years.

Size is the weakest evidence, not the strongest

Size is the first thing people reach for and the least useful thing they can use. CFA does put the Maine Coon at the top of the pedigree size range and notes that a mature male commonly reaches or exceeds 20 pounds (9.1 kg), but the registry sets no minimum, describes females as usually smaller, and allows up to three years for full growth. A large unregistered longhair sits comfortably inside the same range. Structure carries far more information than the scale does. The rectangular head, the visibly square blunt muzzle, the gently concave profile and the uneven coat length are written requirements, and a cat can be heavy without meeting any of them.

Why so many cats look like the breed

Breeds are not separate species. The high quality domestic cat genome published in 2014 concluded that cat breeds were built by strong selection on specific mutations drawn from random bred populations, and a worldwide microsatellite survey of more than 1,100 cats across 17 random bred populations and 22 breeds found most breeds derived from the indigenous cats of their stated home region. The traits that read as Maine Coon, a long shaggy coat, ear tufts, a plumed tail and heavy bone, were in the general cat population before the breed was written down, and they are still there. A New England farm cat with a big ruff is the ancestor of the look, not a diluted copy of it.

What a photo can and cannot tell you

A photo carries the traits that are written into the standard: head outline, muzzle shape, ear set and tufting, coat length distribution, paw shape and tail plume. Those are exactly the things worth checking, and a clear side on photo in good light resolves most of them. What a photo cannot carry is ancestry. Pedigree status is a paperwork fact, held by a registry, and the only document that settles it is a registration certificate naming the cat's parents. A cat can match every line of the CFA standard and still be an unregistered domestic longhair. That is not a failure of the photo. It is what the word pedigree means.

Related guides

Sources