Several readers—thanks, all!—called my attention to the recent birth of a litter of black-footed kittens. (Is that what you call baby black-footed cats?) In March of 2011, as part of my series on “wild cats of the world,” I posted about the biology of the black-footed cat (Felis nigripes), and you should read that first. The species is one of the smallest wild cats (2-5 pounds, or 0.9-2.3 kg), is endangered, and lives in southwest Africa.
According to HuffPo, the source of this video, a pair of black-footed cats at the Philadelphia Zoo (Ascari and Aza) gave birth to three kittens on April 8. This video shows their introduction to the public in May. As usual, there’s cutesy and obtrusive music:
*****
And. . . my lovely cat shirt, embroidered with the Feline Princess of Poland, arrived on Thursday. It was beautifully wrapped in cellophane, and also sports a small red tag on the pocket tag saying “GoGo5,” the name of the Etsy shop of the embroidery artist, Hiroko Kobota. She also made the shirt to my measurements, adding a button-down collar (not the norm in Japan).
Here’s the package, and she thoughtfully added a linen swatch with an embroidered flower-—this is intended for Hili, Andrzej, and Malgorzata:
And a selfie of me in the shirt. Isn’t it beautiful? (See the tail?). It fit perfectly. (You can see a close-up of the embroidery here.)
You can see Hiroko’s Flickr page, showing much of her embroidery, here. Notice that Hili is the latest addition after Grumpy Cat and some other bizarre moggie; and, I must that Hili is the finest-looking of all the cats (Hiroko also does d*gs, but you needn’t look at those.)
Speaking of cats and zoos, this zoo cat has a stay-over at a zoo-keeper’s house (not to make Jerry jealous or anything …)
That was delightful and enchanting!
Frat cat.
+1
Sublime! I kept whispering to Jonas the Tiger, “Munch on the cushion… munch on the cushion”. 🙂
Fun to watch! But makes me so glad that Nuisance-in-Chief Winston is only 10 lbs.
Beautiful job done on the shirt! I think Hilli will like it!
This shirt looks great!
Snazzy buttons. The kind of shirt that looks good tucked or untucked for the true ailurophile hipster.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUU2mS0o870
= a(nother) particularly lovely video of these black – footed kittehs ! including its educational snippets therein.
Blue
ps I myself – along around the weeks’ Tuesdays or Wednesdays – always so look forward to the end – o’ – that – week’s Caturday felid trifecta installments.
Today’s – with these specific kittehs and The Model unfurling and manifesting such ‘evidence evolved’ by way o’ Ms Kubota’s hand of The Superb Kitteh’s likeness – why, today’s on y2014’s Summer Solstice – is one of Professor’s most darling.
Off to the several, local farmers’ markets then !
Happy Summer, All.
Shirt looks great on you, Dr. C. Love the periwinkle blue too.
… or cornflower blue…
It took me far longer to realise why the buttons fastened the wrong way around than I care to admit.
I love the shirt. The Black-footed kittens look like they might be taller laying down than they are upright. I just want to rub those chubby little bellies.
Beautiful shirt, Professor! But what is the ring that you wear?
Jerry,
I’m guessing that the cat is actually on the left side of your shirt (in other words, this is your image reflected in a mirror). You could, if you wanted, reverse the image in photoshop.
Awesome shirt, sir!