Popular cat ranking in Japan.

Ani-com is a health insurance company for "pets". They say over 170,000 pets (of course pet owners) have joined. The Insurance premium depends on the species of pet (dog, cat, bird etc.), pedigree or non-pedigree and where he/she lives. If I had a 1 year old Mmameshiba (8kg or so?), I would pay 2040yen per month. Then I could get these benefits.　The Pet business in Japan has been booming in recent years. I suppose the Aiful Chihuahua hit, the hit Dog series (Big nose photo series) and The TV animal show (Dobutsu Kisotengai) are related to this boom. My American friend laughed at seeting such a Japanese pet craze, but as far as I saw at this site, American people have the same craze. By the way, that pet insurance company Ani-com had research about popular cats and cat names.

Here are the rankings: This is the popular cat ranking for Japan, 2005. No.1...Mix
No.2...American Short Hair
No.3...Scottish Fold
No.4...Russian Blue
No.5...Abyssinian
No.6...Chinchilla
No.7...Maine Coon
No.8...Persian
No.9...Norwegian Forest Cat
No.10...Ragdall
Wow, The are all foreign cats. Is there no MIKENEKO (Three colored cat)　of Japan?.

This is the popular cat name ranking FOR JAPAN, 2005.
No.1...Momo (In Japanese, momo means peach and I am reminded of Ende's book. Basically we like double sounds like momo, mimi, nana, coco for cute pet names) .
No.2...Leo (Do you know "Kimba the white lion"? Originally it was named Leo in Japan.)
No.3...Mie (We Japanese say they cats say "Nyao" and sometimes we say kittnes say "Mie". It remeins me of a girl in Moomin Troll).
No.4...Sakura (This is the only Japanese name, which means cherry blossom)
No.5...Chibi (Tiny)
No.6...Mimi (Another double sound, we call ears mimi too though.)
No.7...Nana (Another double sound, it can be a girl's name too. This year's manga/movies Nana made A big hit.)
No.8...Maroon (A cat who has The name Maroon would normally have chestnut color hair, I suppose.)
No.9...Kuro (Kuro means black in Japanese, For black cats maybe)
No.10...Coco (Yet another double sound. Coco sounds very sweet because of coconuts? Coco Chanel? this is not for Japanese right?)

I want to show you this cute cat fight. I almost melted watching it. Don't miss it.

Related link
The Most Common Name for Dogs in Japan.
Popular first name ranking in 2004.

Comments

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GOOD!!!!!!!!

[Mari]

Hi There.
Pet hotel, pet clothes, pet sweets, pet massage, pet wedding, pet furneral etc. They are so expensive. Anyway I want a hedgehog now.

[Sausage]

It looks like that cat is trying to cast a spell!

[cecile]

i was in japan last week and i was surprised to see more cats this time. i also passed some dog parlors and i was surprised at the queue. a lot of owners wanted to have their dogs professionally massaged. whoa.

[Charles]

Japanese Bobtail cats are not popular? I saw lots of Bobtail 野猫 in Japan. Maybe since they were stray cats, they were the most UNpopular cat breed..