Chinese New Year's Eve has a tradition of keeping the New Year, and the whole family gathers together all night to stay awake until the dawn of the new year shines through the window, which is considered to complete the ceremony of saying goodbye to the old and welcoming the new.

Of course, not sleeping at night is not good for the body, and few modern people will really deliberately stay up all night, at most, stay up until midnight at night, and wait for the period of time when the loudest cannon sound has passed, and they will fall asleep one after another.

In fact, before midnight, Fina, Snow Lion, Richard and Pegasus fell asleep one after another, only Lao Cha, Xinghai and π were still in good spirits.

Lao Cha had just drunk two cups of hot tea, and the caffeine in the tea made him sleepy, and he hoped to have a complete modern New Year, and he had been lying in front of the TV to watch the Spring Festival Gala.

Xinghai played very happily with the kittens, and he didn't sleep for the time being.

π was too excited because of the unexpectedly good results, refreshing the author's background over and over again, and getting more and more energetic.

Today's work in the store is done by Zhang Zi'an himself, and he took the elves out to play, and accidentally dug a deep pit to bury the dog, although he didn't feel it at the time, but now the fatigue accumulated in the body suddenly came up, and it was not yet zero o'clock, so he sat at the table and took a nap on the table.

Boom!

A giant fireflower bomb exploded not too far away, waking Zhang Zi'an up.

Although guns are banned in the city, some people will still secretly set off fireworks with a fluke mentality, especially on Chinese New Year's Eve, thinking that I am not the only one who will not catch me anyway.

He wiped his face and looked around.

Most of the elves were asleep, but they had been awakened by the same giant fireworks. Xinghai went back to the crib and lay down, Lao Cha yawned and turned off the TV, and walked back to the second floor.

π staring at the screen, the lenses of the nose-clipping glasses without prescription reflect the light of the screen.

Giant fireworks bombs seemed to be like horns, blowing the general attack of fireworks, and in an instant, the deafening sound of firecrackers came from all directions on the outskirts of Binhai City, some of which still came from the old neighborhoods in the city.

Zhang Zi'an didn't need to look at his watch, he knew that it was about 0:00 now, and it would be another year to remove the old and welcome the new.

"π, go to sleep. He whispered, "Don't sleep too late, you'll run out of energy tomorrow." ”

π nodded, closed the computer as he said, and jumped into the gondola wicker chair. It didn't close its eyes, staring at the ceiling with a smirk on its lips.

Zhang Zi'an is also ready to sleep, and he will probably still be the only one in the store tomorrow.

He turned off the light and was just about to lie down when he saw two pairs of eyes light up in the darkness at the same time, one green and the other burnt yellow.

"Zi'an, what's the sound?" Lao Cha asked suspiciously, "Did you hear that?"

Zhang Zi'an was stunned, he had just woken up from a nap, and his mind was not very clear. He listened carefully, but heard nothing.

Fina's gaze looked at the wall, behind which was the shoe store next door, "It seems to be...... Those cats are about to give birth......"

What?

Zhang Zi'an understood what Fina meant after half a second, saying that the Abyssinian female cats who were placed next door were about to give birth to kittens?

Female cats generally don't want to be disturbed when they give birth to kittens, so he prepares a quiet delivery room for them to give birth. Having said that, no one knows exactly when they will be born, including the female cats themselves.

These female cats are all first-time mothers and have no experience, and Zhang Zi'an is also experiencing the production process of cats for the first time - yes, his family used to run a pet store, but the pets in the store were all introduced from the outside and had not been bred by hand.

What worries him the most is, what if these female cats lack motherhood and suffer from "child-eating fetish"?

As a breeding female, it is often the female cat that has successfully given birth to a litter that is most valuable, because it confirms that she can give birth and is free of child-eating fetish.

The causes of sub-eating fetish are complex and not fully understood, and it is not only cats that may do it, but also other domestic pets such as dogs, hamsters, rabbits, etc.

It is generally believed that this is because the female animal was disturbed during breeding, or found that the newborn cub was born with poor development or some kind of disease through the sense of smell or touch, so she decided to ignore the cub or refuse to take care of it, or even pushed it out of the nest and left it to fend for itself, and in severe cases, in order to replenish the physical strength lost during childbirth, or even eat the stunted or diseased cub.

Strictly speaking, this is not cruelty, but the survival instinct of animals formed through the survival of the fittest under the harsh conditions of nature, and even if it is domesticated by humans, it is still partially preserved. In order to ensure their own survival, in order to allow healthy cubs to eat more milk, they can only eliminate weak cubs.

The problem, however, is that first-time mothers are inexperienced and may misjudge whether their cubs are healthy or not, and may eat healthy cubs as if they were born with a disease.

Even cubs that do suffer from congenital diseases and stunted growth can survive and even grow up healthy with the help of humans, but animals are not aware of this, and the pain and tension during childbirth make them act more instinctively.

On the other hand, there are a small number of female cats, who eat their cubs not because they judge that the cubs have congenital diseases, but simply want to eat, which is a typical lack of motherhood.

According to statistics, cats have the lowest survival rate of kitten pups during their first birth, and this is because female cats are inexperienced. If the first birth is survived, the survival rate of the kitten will increase steadily, reaching a peak at the fifth birth, and then rapidly declining from the sixth birth. As long as it is a slightly conscientious breeder, the cat will generally not be allowed to breed more than five times.

Fortunately, cats and dogs don't eat their babies as badly as hamsters and rabbits, which can eat the entire litter of cubs if they don't agree with each other. When Zhang Zi'an heard that Little Celery and they were going to try to breed hamsters next semester, he secretly kept this in his heart and prepared to remind them at the right time, otherwise they would be hated for eternity if they made a mistake, and Little Celery would definitely be very sad.

When Zhang Zi'an heard what Fina said, he immediately dispelled his sleepiness and remembered the Abyssinian cats waiting to give birth next door.

In order not to disturb their production, he bought a baby monitor from the Internet, and placed the transmitter end in the cat's delivery room and the receiver end in his bedroom, so as to keep track of their condition and prevent accidents.

Lao Cha and Fina had just heard an unusual noise from the baby monitor, and they had judged that the Abyssinian cat might be about to give birth—perhaps it was caused by the earth-shattering giant fireworks.

Thinking of this, Zhang Zi'an hurriedly got dressed, "You go to sleep first, I'll go next door and have a look." ”

Fina jumped out of the princess's bed, "Hongu also goes." ”