A breed with long flowing hair which was named because it was said to be very placid. However, Ragdolls are normal cats in terms of their behaviour.
Health and welfare issues
Ragdolls can carry a gene that leads to a form of heart disease (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy) that can lead to heart failure at an early age. Screening tests became available in 2007 and since then breeders have been working to eradicate the problem – always ask the breeder to show the HCM certificates for the cats used to produce your kitten. This breed also has a risk of polycystic kidney disease (PKD).
We have limited the information about inherited disorders to those conditions that are known and proven to exist within a breed. For many breeders and many conditions, insufficient information may be available at this time to know whether any particular breed is necessarily free of any particular condition.
In general, pedigree breeds use a much smaller gene pool for breeding than domestic cats and therefore have a higher risk of developing inherited disorders. In addition, a number of 'newer' pedigree breeds are derived from matings between one or more 'older' breeds, and in these situations perpetuation of inherited problems that were seen in older breeds is likely within the newer breeds.
image supplied by Animal Photography