Darkies 11th

Originally the 11th litter was planned to be born to Bella, but since the mating was utterly impossible with a foreign male (she didn't let him get close, despite her intense and raging heat), I just had to turn things around the best of my abilities and since Didi was already closing in on her 6th birthday, I hoped to get similar type of plan working with her. My greatest thank you's to Didi's foster dad, as without him this would have never been a possibility - Didi has surpassed her original contract by 2 years at this point. ♥

Didi's second and now definitely last litter is a special one - I picked up her mate from Sweden, SE*Eclipsim Tywin Lannister ("Tywin") came to Mäntsälä for some courting. This way we get sort of like an imported cat but it's like we are skipping the first waiting period and just get the benefits. Even though the journey was long and rough, the stud was incredibly kind and polite, didn't really seem to think all that much about going on a cruise with a foreigner.

The couple met during midnight on July 14th and their first impressions was rather beautiful - they were both very interested of one another, were circling each other and sniffing each other thoroughly and were chirping to one another. It only took 3 hours for the first mating to occur, meaning that the litter due date would be 20th of September 2025.

*FIDarkie's**	Colour and gender	Status
Hekireki "Hilkka"	RAG h 04 21 / ♀	Reserved
Arashi "Nalle"	RAG c 04 / ♂	Stays home
"Peppi"	RAG g 04/ ♀	Looking for home
Raikou "Milla"	RAG f 04 / ♀	Reserved
"Jasmin"	RAG g 04 21 / ♀	Looking for home
Inabikari "Helinä"	RAG j 04 21 / ♀	Reserved
Kouzui "Lumi"	RAG h/j 04 21 / ♀	Reserved
"Ronja"	RAG j 04 21 / ♀	Looking for home
Raiun "Pikkis"	RAG n 04 21 / ♂	Reserved
Doshaburi "Maija"	RAG g 04 / ♀	Reserved

From the combination of

Didi ja Tywin

FI*Darkie's Dokujibara no tsubomi, "Melodia" (RAG a 21) x SE*Eclipsim Tywin Lannister, "Tywin" (RAG d 03, homozygous for chocolate)

Parent's pedigrees (inbreeding 0,225% in 10th generation)

28.10.2025

It's been a month since the last homepage update, but it has been so busy and constantly something. Here's a quick recap of the month:

26.9. We took Pikkumies, or more familiarly Pikkis, to see a vet as his weightgain was just not constant and suddenly one night he was clearly pained from his belly and didn't feel ok enough to settle. We had a strong suspect about a colic-y episode and we aimed at it with Synulox-antibiotics. His situation calmed down and milk started to stick to his body once again!
4.10. I noted that Didi had an injury on her bottom teat on her left side, we consulted Agria vet via their app and just continued to observe the situation. The teat kept draining, dropping clear liquid with no scent and Didi was completely fine about the babies suckling on it, it was only creating a mess, but that's minor. Due the teat being overall calm and Didi was fine with me even twisting and turning on it, had no fever, so we just continued on.
Kittens were also photographed a few times. ♥
8.10. Had to tape the hind legs on few of the kittens as their legs kept sliding to the sides. This is most likely due the uterus being so extra cramped that they just need a small assistance with the positioning, especially Nalle and Peppi. Also, suddenly we had to put in the litterbox. And it feels like they were just born!
10.10. Had to start with the solids already, even with additional milk it just wasn't enough with the group as big as this. They are still not quite there yet with the litterbox, but very close!
15.10. Didi required emergency stop at the vet, as she was suddenly just laying down on the ground with pain-expression and didn't want any treats. The injured teat was suddenly very painful and she didn't let me touch it. I think that the fact that she's nursing less now allowed the injury to come through more clearly. Checked her temperature at home and it was 40,3C, meaning fever.
At the clinic they checked the status of the uterus with an ultrasound, found some cloudy substance from her bladder and took a sterile sample of her pee, drew some blood and checked the injured teat by eye and feel and it's milk content under microscope. Her blood revealed leucocytes levels almost double of what is deemed healthy, some free liquid was found from the abdominal cavity in the ultrasound, her fever had gone down, but the clinic believed me when I said it was high at home. They took the sterile urine sample directly from her bladder (which was quite difficult as since Didi started to nurse, she decided peeing once a day is sufficient enough) and they tried to culture it to see if it would start growing. The milk sample revealed a great amount of inflammatory cells which indicates mastitis - a mammary gland infection. The cloudy or grainy view of the bladder caused some worry about UTI.
She got on antibiotics regardless, thrice a day until our control and pain medication 3-5 days. Kittens were okayed to help drain the glands, so we allowed the kittens to nurse under observation just for a few minutes at once. All the rest of the time Didi had to wear her gown... ♥
16.10. Either the milk or Didi's meds caused some lovely diarrhea episode to the kittens. :') Poor baby Helinä had extremely slimy and watery diarrhea late in the evening. So, we're off the milk.
17.10. Didi got prescribed Galastop to help her milk production to cease.
21.10. We had Didi's control visit and I took along our bunch of babies, as since it's beginning, we still were struggling with the diarrhea and I was afraid that the babies would dehydrate. Didi's bloodwork still showed higher than hoped leucocytes, so even though they were coming down we continued with the antibiotics for 3 more days. Bladder was still looking like it had prior in the ultrasound, but the free liquid had gone away. Milk from the damaged teat was compared to that of a healthy one and it still had some inflammatory cells in it. The kittens looked good for the doctor, few of them were a bit dehydrated but one of the maind suspected reasons for our diarrhea (which two of them had while waiting for Didi's examination to be done with) was the really fast pace we swapped from milk to solids. We tried changing to more gentle food for the digestion, started adding NaCl-solution in the food and will try other products to try to ease their gut (earlier we used Inupekt, now turn to Kaopekt).
25.10. Kittens started to throw up, but are still lively, alert and playful, ate with a good appetite - until late in the evening Lumi was suddenly lethargic, inattentive and clearly in pain. She fought me while taking her temperature but the thermometer still read over 39'C. I syringe fed her small doses with plenty of fluids and after a few diarrhea she started feeling better. Also Peppi, Milla, Hilkka and Pikkis had intestinal distress and had trown up at least once. The only difference to the day before was the fact that I had managed to overboil the rice the I used in their chicken-rice mix. Is this just too strong for them, causing bellyache?? Though earlier Peppi threw up Gastrointestinal mousse.
26.10. All weights have gone down, appetites are gone. Nalle and Ronja started to throw up and had severe diarrhea. Contacted the emergency clinic and dragged our 10 babies in - clinical checkups for all and only few had dehydrated a bit (thanks to excessive use of additional liquids!!) and poor baby Nalle had a clear fever. Many of them had diarrhea on the thermometer as they were taking temps which had extremely foul smell to it, meaning the intestines are truly in distress.
Kittens were prescribed Tylosin for 5 days, twice a day for 5 days, easy-to-digest foods and support for the gut at the side. This means that the following 5 days are spent with these doses of meds:
- 100 doses of antibiotics (10 kittens, 2 doses a day, for 5 define_syslog_variables)
- 150 doses of Kaopekt Forte -solution (10 kittens, 3 doses a day, dor at least 5 days)
- 50 doses of Enteromicroa (10 kittens, 1 dose a day, for at least 5 days)
- 50 doses of Nutriplus-vitamin gel (10 kittens, 1 dose a day, for at least 5 days)
I prepped the doses of antibiotics to syringes for easier use. 1 ml a day twice a day. This is super bad tasting stuff, so it's not going to be a fun excersice. ^^'

So it's a bit hectic! A lot has happened and a lot will happen. Maija-baby will move to live with his uncle Baloo and Milla-baby (or Pasha) will move to live with the girls Bella, Vaahtis and Cookie from 9.2-litter. The rest are slowly beginning to look for their homes. :) School on my end seems to take the toll of the babies as there just is so much to medicate now.

24.9.2025

The kittens turn one week today! The babies are growing plenty, two of the kittens are already above 200 grams. The smallest of the bunch (we've been calling him Pikkumies) has been developing on his own pace and has required more support, but he is still growing. He's over 100 grams now and very lively.

Their color is slowly becoming visible, looks like there are some tabbies and some without, but it looks like the sire of the litter, Tywin, is a high mitted bicolor (bicolor that only gives mitted offspring when combined to a colorpoint), which means that all of the kittens are mitted!! ♥♥ As a great mitted enthusiast I couldn't be happier!

18.9.2025

Yesterday evening Didi begun her labor, she started pushing at around 8pm and first kitten was born a bit before nine. And it was a long night from there.

I hadn't taken her to ultrasound or xray to see how many kittens were inside, in hindsight it would've been nice to have a bit of knowledge before she started - she had 12 fetuses attached to her uterus, TWELVE! One of these had passed away a bit before birthing and was stillborn, another fetus had aborted at around 40 days of gestation. The fetus had distinctive features - legs and overall it's build was that of a cat, some bones had formed already but it's placenta was completely pale and leather-like, it felt like it was dry. I believe the placenta had deattached for one reason or another and it had then stopped developing. For those interested I have uploaded photos of the aborted fetus purely for educational purposes, VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVICED, photo 1, photo 2.

Regardless, Didi gave birth to 10 healthy and liveful, though partly quite tiny, kittens. Welcome to this world Darkie's Eleventh ♥

"Red", born 20:59, 92g, girl
"Yellow", born 21:06, 105g, male
"Pink/black", born 21:18, 79g, girl
"Lilac", born 21:27, 89g, girl
"Minty", born 21:41, 78g, girl
"2x red", born 21:59, 92g, girl
"Red/yellow", born 22:33, 73g, girl
"2x yellow", born 23:18, 95g, girl
"Black/red", born 00:13, 67g, male
10th kitten had aborted earlier in gestation
11th kitten was stillborn, weight with placenta around 100g, a male
"Black/yellow", born 01:29, 69g, girl

It's going to be incredibly busy ~15 weeks. The kittens turn 14 weeks just under Christmas, but since Christmas is such a risky holiday, I think I'm going to prolong their departure...

What has happened this far

13.9. It's mind blowing how she is just stedily gaining more and more, currently she's at almost 7,4 kilos. Didi hasn't been the biggest fan of love and pets during her pregnancy, even feeling the movement of the kittens is not on her approved list. This is weird, as Didi is one to love loving. Regardless, she's close to us constantly.
9.9. She has gained 2,4 kilos since mating - Didi is now incredible 7,2 kilos. o_o
5.9. I realised I had marked the due date wrong - she's due on 17th of September, not 20th! I wasn't far off, but critical last days for observation purposes.
2.9. Weight 6882 g. Our goal was to hit 6,6 kilos and now we've gone over that as well. Can't remember if we've ever breached the goal by this much, this early, or if ever.
26.8. Kicks present! Kittens are alive and moving. Some 20 days still...
24.8. 41th day of pregnancy today! Have yet to feel movement, but any day now...
17.8. Visited my mother at Karjalohja, mandatory weekend trip. Didi is clearly not able to handle car-rides at this point of her pregnancy, she's not the biggest fan of carrides anyway. Feeling nauseous is not a nice thing...
11.8. She's already at 5660 grams - her weight curve is much more stable now than on the previous go. Her appetite has been good and no foods have caused any issues.
3.8. Roughly 3 weeks from mating and her teats are plump and pink. ♥ On Thursday, 31st of July she was 5184 grams, meaning a gain of 454 grams already.
24.7. Didi is now 5117 g. O_O
21.7. Didi is now at 4952 grams - feels that she just can't get enough of food. I noted that her stool has been on the looser side - could this be an indicator of succesful mating..?? During the issues with her previous pregnancy, when she got a nasty intestine inflammation, I have been extra cautious and immediately started to support her bowel with probiotics. But then again... Additional hormonal activity can also cause changes in the bowel..?
14.-16.7. The stud has arrived to Finland! Didi and Tywin are having their honeymoon in Mäntsälä. Didi's weight after the mating is 4730 grams.
13.7. Didi arrived to Mäntsälä! Unfortunately, for the first time, Didi is also spraying while in heat....