All of Ivy's kittens are doing really well. They all seem healthy and happy!
That's all the news for this post. Here's some extra photos from today's photoshoot!
I think by now, most of you know that Ivy delivered three healthy babies late Saturday night.
Our regular art contributor, "Bindi Luckycat" has already contributed a drawing for the occasion:
DJ plans to name the three kittens after Ivy League schools, or mascots, or something related. But we're not completely sure of the sexes yet - it's difficult to tell when they're this young. Our best guess so far is that #1 and #3, the lighter-colored ones, are girls. #2, the darker one, is a boy. Probably.
We've been pretty busy since then, and I have a million videos and photos to edit and publish. In the meantime, we have published the entire three-hour labor and delivery video from the livestream, unedited. If you decide to watch this, just be aware that the first kitten doesn't appear until right around 1 hour in. You can, of course, skip ahead to that point.
We plan to publish a lot more photos and some great 4K video, some of which you can see me filming in the archive footage above. It may take a few days. We're likely to publish the videos to the Patreon supporters a day or two early.
Thank you to everyone for your support, advice, commentary... and just being a part of this experience of bringing three wonderful new kittens into the world. It's been great having all of you along for the ride, whether on the livestream chat, twitter, or email. Thank you all!
A bonus from Bindi Luckycat.
Today, Animal Outreach Society of McHenry brought us a beautiful new momcat to care for until she has her kittens - and then to care for them all until the kittens can be adopted.
She was rescued after her family abandoned all their cats when their house was foreclosed. One of her sisters was also pregnant and ended up giving birth at the vet today while they were getting screened! We expect our momcat to deliver any day now.
The new momcat doesn't have a name yet -- at least, not one we know! DJ is the one responsible for naming all the cats, but if you have a suggestion, you can tweet it to her twitter, @djkittenacademy.
We've moved our ceiling camera to the annex, so we can all keep an eye on our new arrival. If we're lucky, perhaps she'll even deliver on the live stream!
Here's a video of her playing with a catnip toy, just after moving in. She's super friendly!
We took a lot of video today, but it'll mostly require some serious editing before it can be published. There was one clip, though, of Nutmeg, which was pretty much good-to-go, and it has already been published to anyone who pledged us $1/month or more on Patreon. It will be available to the rest of the world in the next day or two.
In the meantime, we have some photos to share with all of you now. We think some of these are really fantastic. As always, click the photos to open the full-screen version.
Toffee wonders how to pronounce "campylobacter."
We got word back from the vet today about the fecal culture that was performed. It turns out the kittens have two things going on: feline coronavirus and campylobacter jejuni. Now, don't let the wikipedia pages scare you; neither one is likely to be an issue in the long term.
There's no treatment for the coronavirus, but the kittens are likely to fight it off themselves in a while - or at least just be carriers and it won't cause them any problems.
The bacteria, of course, there's a treatment for. It comes as a powder we will put on their food. We'll be picking that up at the vet appointment we have at 6:00pm tonight.
We'll also be bringing Nutmeg, Clove, Poppy, Tamarind, and Fennel along to the vet appointment. It seems that contrary to policy, they were probably not SNAP tested prior to attending the Academy. We don't believe they have any of the issues the SNAP test checks, but we will get it done just so we can rest easier.
That's all the news for now!
Clove likes tests that are a snap.
Yesterday, we did a bit of a photoshoot and took some video in the kitten room, to put together a quick "Thank You" video for our supporters on Patreon. We also got some photos in the course of doing that, which are at the end of this post.
But before we get to that, we'd like to update you all on the health of the kittens. The charts below are all part of the kitten weights spreadsheet which you are welcome to look at for more details. All weights are in ounces, because why not use an archaic measurement system for something important?
The Spice Girls + Nutmeg are all on a course of Amoxicillin now. And also, Neomycin ointment for their eyes. They all seem healthy, but you have to carry on antibiotics for a while to be sure you're not leaving any nasties behind. And as you can see, Fennel had a rough time, but she's rapidly recovering! We're going to continue to give her special food until we run out, probably.
As you can see, Toffee, Custard, Cobbler and Shortcake are all at the same weight that Biscuit, Pudding, and Crumpet were when they were fixed and adopted. However, we're still holding them back until we can solve at least the diarrhea that Toffee is still having. They also all have oddly swollen bellies that no amount of deworming, or vet work has managed to definitively solve -- but the vet's last theory was they just like to overeat, and if the diarrhea is solved, we're willing to go with that. Generally, though, they are healthy, happy, and gaining weight. Currently, we are waiting on the results of a fecal culture that should be done by the end of the week. They're also all presently on Metronidazole and the same Neomycin.
Just for comparison, here's the chart of Hazel's litter from the start of the year. This is what it looks like when you have a present, attentive momcat and super healthy babies:
All right, on to the photos!
It's been a while since we've done a really short blog post. So, here's one for you.
We now have our own Patreon page. This is a place where you can pledge to support us with a donation every month, and in return, we can give you some minor (very minor!) rewards.
If you have previously donated, and you would like your donation counted towards the Patreon rewards, email us: headmaster@kitten.academy
There's a special, but simple video up already as a thank you to any Patreons (?) who pledge to us there. Here's a preview image:
We've got a lot to cover in this post, so I'll keep it as concise as possible. And also, pictures of the kittens to help break it up a bit!
Not even started and Cobbler is bored.
We have a whole bunch of business to cover first, before we get to talk about the kittens.
First off, we have a Twitter now. We tweet things at you, and you tweet back, and it's pretty wonderful. Please follow us on Twitter, because that's the first place we announce things now, and also post bonus spontaneous photos. And also just interact. Our twitter handle is @kitten_academy.
Fennel is annoyed by advertising.
Advertising: We tried it. I don't think it is really worthwhile. Ads are annoying, and if our reports from Google are to be believed, then what we're seeing is about $3.50 for about 40,000 views -- that's one day's worth of activity. The way I see it, if Google showed up at my front door and said "Hey, there's 40,000 people outside, and I'll pay you to go out there and annoy them for 30 seconds. I'll pay you $3.50," I would definitely not take that deal. So why should I take it here?
Perhaps we'll revisit that decision someday. For now, it doesn't make sense. We will be turning off the ads. We already turned them off for the live stream.
Donations: We set up a donation page here to see how it would go. And it went surprisingly well! Not everyone wants to or can use the methods on our donation page as it stands, so we're planning on adding a PayPal option soon, and also Patreon. Frankly, I'm pretty excited about Patreon. It's a place where you can sign up to pledge a certain amount of money every month -- and what's cooler is that we can offer some rewards to you if you do; things like early access to certain videos, or a private live stream up close with the kittens -- of course if we do that, we'd publish it for everyone... afterwards. I think it's a great option, and it's coming very soon!
Custard looking for a handout.
Already, so many of you have been spectacularly generous. I honestly do not know how to thank you for your help. I talked a little about how much taking care of these kittens costs us in my previous post here. Even with your amazing contributions, we're not breaking even -- but we never expected to, either. We're in this and will support these kittens no matter what. But your help makes it easier. I'd like to take a minute to shout out to our donators so far by name. I don't want to "dox" anyone, so I'll just go by first name and country:
I'm not sure whether I should be calling out individual contribution amounts. Every bit helps! You've all been generous beyond what we could expect. You are heroes to us and you are heroes to kittens. You are heroes to Toffee. And you're wonderful people, who must sleep very well at night, knowing you have made the world a better place.
Chat on our Live Stream: A lot of you really liked this, and I did too. But it was getting more and more impossible to police, and keep relevant and family-friendly. We're going to try bringing it back, but with a very extensive list of banned words. We'll see whether we can make it work. When we're ready to turn it on again for this experiment, we'll announce it via Twitter first.
Toffee wants to know if we'll ever talk about the kittens.
Now, on to the kittens!
Toffee, Cobbler, Custard, and Shortcake are all more than big enough to graduate and be adopted. However, they've had diarrhea since day one that so far, we've not been able to stop, despite numerous efforts. We've tried various foods, including Hill's ID -- prescription food for cats with digestion issues. We've tried antibiotics. We've tried probiotics. (Do antibiotics and probiotics cancel out?!) We've had numerous dewormings - with three different dewormers. We've had a bunch of vet visits, and a more than a few fecal exams. We even had an X-ray. So, their graduation has been delayed until we can see them having good poops. Next up is a fecal culture, a more extensive sort of fecal test that takes lots of poop, and several days of lab work. It's not cheap like a regular fecal exam. We dropped off the lots of poop for that today, and we expect the results early next week.
Despite the diarrhea, they all seem to be in great spirits, active, and gaining weight. So overall, we're not too concerned about their health.
What're you lookin' at?
The newer crew, Nutmeg, Clove, Poppy, Tamarind, and Fennel are mostly well and active. We think they might all have a minor eye infection, we're treating for that. Fennel, however, has shown a steep decline the last couple days, in weight and in activity. We're not sure why, yet, but we're feeding her on a special mix of pumpkin, chicken baby food, and KMR powder until she can go to the vet -- which is scheduled for today at 15:30. She loves the special food so much... she might not want to get well!
I'd like to share our kitten weight data with you. You don't need to be interested in this, but for people who are, it gets updated nearly every day. All the weights we keep right now are in ounces. You can find the entire spreadsheet by clicking here. Please note that each 'class' is on a separate tab, with graphs on the last tabs.
Shortcake is confused by spreadsheets.
Finally, if you've read this far, you should know that we've had an awful lot of people tell us on the chat, on Twitter, and via emails that we should make Toffee a permanent member of the Kitten Academy faculty. If you think so too, Tweet us with the hashtag #professortoffee
Bonus Photos!
Here at the Kitten Academy, we love it when fans of the kittens send us their artistic interpretations of the Academy cats!
This week, we have some art from a new fan, Liekki from Finland. Liekki has sent us an amazing work, with all the current Academy Kittens in outer space! I love this so much - and it even comes in two versions; one is made to tile so you can have infinite cat wallpaper! Astounding! As a bonus, Liekki has made prints available in her online shop! I already ordered the T-shirt. Can't wait!
We also have new contributions from frequent contributor Bindi Luckycat, who certainly has a recognizable style. A cheat-sheet of all the kittens, Nutmeg and Toffee together, and a special bonus drawing of her own cats. Thanks, Bindi! Adorable!
And finally, we have three new contributions from prolific contributor KaramelCraft in Israel. Real watercolors and mixed media! So very fabulous! I especially love the little meowing kitten. I can practically hear him! ... or maybe that's Toffee I can hear.
If you've sent in fan art and we haven't published it, we probably lost track of it. Send us an e-mail to remind us. Or, if you have new art, send it to us in an email! Each and every one of you are absolutely amazing! The kittens are certainly blessed to have such talented fans.
As always, e-mails can be addressed to headmaster@kitten.academy
Toffee....... tired out from reading this post.
This is going to be a VERY long post, with a lot of explanation. But we hope you get a chance to read it, because we're opening up some information we've never shared before!
We hope you comment on this. And if you have any questions or suggestions, we hope you email us at headmaster@kitten.academy -- also, we're interspersing random recent photographs from Mr. Academy's cell phone to help take the sting out.
TL;DR: You all want to watch ads to help the kittens. Watching ads will help the kittens. So please do watch ads when they arrive.
So, recently, we ran a poll on the live stream, asking whether people would rather watch advertisements, donate, or just leave the kittens at the academy to starve.
Toffee is so hungry, he'll eat potatoes and squash!
OK, not really the last thing. We've never expected anyone else to help us on this. We never even really expected anyone else to know about it, or watch. When we first started the YouTube channel and livestream, we thought only our friends would care. And when we started this website, it was only because we happened to be browsing domain names and couldn't resist the adorableness of a name like kitten.academy. We're so glad -- so humbled that all of you have joined us and participated in the love for these kittens since then.
Toffee and Tamarind napping together!
We pay for all food, vet bills, and everything else for these kittens. We don't even let the shelter pay for anything.
Toffee and Poppy visit the vet.
"Mr. Academy's" mom -- our mom watches the stream and follows us on YouTube -- suggested we tell you all how much money we spend. In the last month, we've spent a little over a thousand dollars in vet bills for these kittens, and almost the same amount again in supplies cost -- mostly food. We wouldn't normally bring numbers into this, but it was Mom's idea. She even said we could blame her, so we are. It's all your fault, Mom. .... I'm sorry. We love you, Mom. (Incidentally, we've asked my mom to be a guest writer or artist on this blog. Please encourage her in the comments!)
We don't have a photo of Mom on our phone, so accept this photo of Nutmeg and the Spice Girls.
Just so you know, the expense in the last month is not completely normal. For instance, Hazel's litter at the beginning of the year had only one vet visit. Hazel was an incredible mom and her kittens were super healthy. And this month, things are even worse than usual -- We had Victoria Sponge Cake here, she was singularly unwell, and spent two nights at the vet. That was almost five hundred dollars, all by itself. And just for the record, she came back healthy and happy, and is at On Angel's Wings now, waiting to be adopted. She is really sweet. I just dropped in to see her a couple days ago, and she just wanted to roll over and have me rub her belly and purr. As an adult cat, she's a super winner!
Vikki on her way to see the vet, with Toffee.
Before we get into the poll results, let me say that we've never, ever taken money for this before, in any way. We put up a donation link a week or two ago, on the website. We got exactly ONE donation so far. Marius, from Germany... you're awesome! So many people asked us how to donate you are the only one who actually did. Marius in Germany is a hero to kittens!!
We don't have a photo of Marius, so here's one of Professor Loganberry enjoying a nap.
A number of you have asked for PayPal as a payment option. We think that's a good idea. We will be providing that. As soon as we get time to sort it out. As you all know, the kittens here are the priority, and between "Mr. Academy's" day job that provides the money for these kittens in the first place, and the fact that DJ is out of town this month and can't help out around the Academy, time is tight!
You are overwhelmingly in favor of advertising. Now, so far, we don't know what we're doing, and we just hope we manage everything appropriately. YouTube has several types of advertisement. Our plan is to only allow the kinds of ads that appear at the bottom of the screen during a video, and nothing that's too intrusive or interrupting. But we don't know what YouTube will demand.
WITNESS ME! Uhm - I mean, advertise me?
The important thing here is that the poll says watching ads is better than donating. So we hope you all will understand when ads show up, and watch them. But for our part, we will monitor how things go, and if it turns out to be a real problem, we'll revisit this decision. We'd much rather continue to cover all expenses alone, and have you enjoy the kittens and increase exposure, than have you help with the expenses. If that's the choice. If you can help, and the kittens also get just as much exposure and enjoyment, then that's a win for everyone!
Nutmeg and Toffee. #Bros4Life.
Any of you who have read this far; you're awesome. We're sorry there's so much to say about this. But we're very flattered that you're involved enough to read this entire post! And the kittens are glad too.
Nutmeg, Tamarind, Toffee.
