Welcome to my Kadoatery Guide!=) Last updated: 7/10/07

So, I take it you want to feed a kadoatie. Well, you've come to the right place.=)

First, allow me to explain what the kadoatery is exactly. It's a place "where Kadoaties go when their owners are on holiday." The kadoaties get very hungry without their owners around to give them food, and it's our job to feed them. ;)

Now, in order for us to do a good deed, for many of us, we need a little incentive. ;) Once you feed certain amounts of kads, you get trophies, an avatar, and later on even a kadoatie (Note- This was written by TNT in a Neopian Times Editorial. No one has received a kad yet, even though some people have fed incredible amounts of kadoaties.)!

Here are the prizes you can get:

1 Kad Fed: Bronze Trophy

10 Kads: Silver Trophy

25 Kads: Gold Trophy

75 Kads: Avatar

As of the Neopian Times Editorial 239, there is no longer the possibility of receiving a kadoatie after a certain number of feeds, unfortunately.=(

As you can see, you don't get NP or item rewards from feeding kads, but many of us do it out of the joy of giving, or because it is a game, and it's fun. :P

Now, I suppose you're wondering how on earth do you feed one of those things. If you've been to the Kadoatery recently, chances are it looked something like this:

When the kads rs, it usually looks something like this:

As you can see, most of those items are quite inexpensive, and won't put a huge dent in your bank account if you feed them.

Where all the kadoaties are already fed, or there are one or two really expensive items that no one wants to feed. However, at a certain times every day, all the kadoaties get hungry, and most of them ask for really inexpensive foods. This time is called restock, or rs. There are two kinds of restocks- main and mini. The main is when most of the kads restock all at the same time (like the screenie above). A mini is when one or just a few kad rs at a different time than the main. They always appear at the very bottom of the kadoatery, so that's where you should look if you're refreshing for one. Minis are created when the kads ask for a very expensive item that is fed after the main. Sometimes, a mini and a main happen at the same time, so the mini becomes a part of the main and will no longer rs on its own. This is called a merge.

The best way to find out when rs is is to go to the Kadoatery board. It's in the games section of the neoboards, and should usually have Kadoatery somewhere in the title. It usually has stars in it too, and shouldn't be too hard to find. It's a 24-hour board, so it will always be there to help you.=) Once you go to the board, don't immediately ask when rs is, because some people may find that to be a little rude. Look in people's siggies, and usually one or two of them will have the times, that look something like this,

Only :xx will be numbers. If someone has just :xx in their siggy, it just means that they don't know the time, or they aren't timekeeping at the moment. The only time you should ever ask for rs times is if you've thoroughly looked through a few pages and still can't find the time. It's very rare that this would happen, because most of the time, there's a few people who are keeping times. If you're having trouble find the time, try doing a search using control f for "Main." It works great. ;) Also, a board solely for posting times and lists has appeared in the games chat, which is an excellent place for finding times. Just make sure that you always check the most recent post there so you don't get confused. In my experience, I've found checking this board for times to be far more reliable than checking the kad board for times.

Now that you found the times, I'm sure you're wondering what they mean. All the times are given in minutes after the hour (the hour isn't included because it makes it more difficult for people who are in different time zones than NST), and are the earliest times the kadoatery can rs. The kads can take at least 28 minutes after the given time to rs, and sometimes can take upwards of an hour! It is normal that an rs isn't on the exact minute given, so please don't complain when it isn't. The kads always rs within the first few seconds of the minute, so that is when you should be refreshing. If kads don't rs right on the first minute that is predicted, they are still considered pending, and you'll want to refresh exactly 7 minutes after the time that they didn't rs.

Sound complicated? It's really not too bad. Here's an example: Say that you go to the kad boards, and you see this: "Main :00"(Note- This is probably not the actual time, I'm just using it as an example.) This means that the earliest time the kadoatery can rs is at 00 minutes after the hour, so you would start refreshing at x:00:00, x being the current hour. If it didn't rs at :00, then you would start refreshing again at x:07:00 and then again at x:14:00 if it didn't rs yet, and so forth. It may sound a little tricky right now, but keep trying and I'm sure you'll get the hang of it. RS times didn't use to work this way, but all of us old feeders were able to adapt just fine. :)

After the kadoatery restocks, the next one won't happen until at least 28 minutes have gone by(yes, 28, TNT thought 30 was too easy or something :P). So, let's say that the main went at :06(6 minutes after the hour). The earliest time it could restock again would be 28 minutes later, so the new main would be at :34. Also, if someone has a siggy that says something like "Mini :01(2)," the 2 just means two kads will rs in that mini. This system of restocks just changed very recently, and while it is annoying for timekeepers to constantly be adding 7s (which has proven itself to be quite difficult for people that aren't good at adding odd numbers such as myself), it's really not too bad once you get used to it. There's a full explanation of the new system here.

Sometimes restocks go very quickly, or you forget to refresh at the top of a minute, so you could end up missing all or part of a restock. This is normal for new feeders, so just keep trying, and hopefully you'll get the hang of it.=) Even experienced feeders missed restocks every now and then, so don't get discouraged.

Now that you know all about restock times, I'll get into the 3 main methods of feeding: Inventory, SDB, and Shop Wiz.

Inventory Feeding:

Inventory feeding is probably the most common way that people feed kads. What you do is you buy a bunch of different items that the kads ask for, and hope that they come up at rs. If it rses, and you see one of your items, you just click on the kad's cage to feed it. If you're lucky, you'll see something like this come up:

This means that you successfully fed the kad, and the item has been removed from your inventory so you'll have to buy it again if you want to feed that item ever again. Congratulations. xD Sometimes, however, you aren't as lucky, and someone clicked on the kad and fed it before you. That looks something like this:

This just means that you weren't quite fast enough and got beaten, or pwned (which is just internet slang for owned, if you aren't familiar with the term ;) ). It's very common that you'll get beaten on your first few attempts, so don't get discouraged. There are a lot of really fast feeders out there, so don't expect to be able to feed every time your items come up. Even the best feeders get pwned every now and then, so it's really nothing to be ashamed of.=)

When inventory feeding, especially if you're new, it's best to try and choose certain foods that you don't think a lot of people will carry. Desert foods, pizza, hot dogs, chia pops, spooky food, organics, potatoes, and dice-a-roo foods items usually go very fast because they're either in many people's inventories, or there's a few very fast feeders who feed them, so you're not likely to beat them. I'd stay away from those food groups, at least when you're first starting. The more expensive the food, usually, the easier it is to feed, so you might want to start by feeding items 2k and over, but whatever way works for you is fine.=) There's a completely food list that my awesome friend Toni made here that you can choose your food from.

When choosing an inventory, I usually get a bunch of items with one word in them (such as sandwich), so whenever I see that word, I can click and hopefully feed the kad. That way I can always remember exactly what I have in my inventory, so I don't have to doubt whether I have an item or not. If you have a really good memory though, you might want to try a random inventory, with a bunch of foods that aren't all in the same category. That way, your items come up more, and you probably won't end up being pwned to every item by one person, unless they have the same exact random inventory as you, which is unlikely.

With the extremely large amount of feeding today, it's very hard and nearly impossible to choose an inventory that no one else has. No matter what you choose, you're bound to get pwned every now and then. Or a lot, if you're at all like me. :P Just keep trying. If it gets to the point where you can't get a single feed in, you might want to try something feeding something else. I experimented with a lot of different inventories before I found one that worked for me. And even it's not perfect, either. ;)

Inventory feeding is usually the most successful form of feeding for new feeders. It may take awhile to find an inventory that works for you, but once you get the hang of it, it's great. I went pink doing inventory feeding and nothing else. However, if you're interested in continuing feeding after you get the avatar, or inventory feeding doesn't work for you, you might want to try one of the next two methods.

SDB Feeding:

The second method of feeding is Safety Deposit Box Feeding (or SDB for short). With SDB feeding, you buy a bunch of kad items and put them in your SDB. When it's rs time, you would have both the kadoatery window open and your SDB open. If you see a kad ask for an item in your SDB, you just copy the name of the item, paste it in the search box of your SDB, and quickly take out the item so it's in your inventory, and click on the kad. This method usually works pretty well, unless you go for an item that someone else has in their inventory. Try to choose uncommon foods, or foods that are a little bit more expensive, so it's less likely that someone will have it in your inventory and beat you.

SDB feeding is probably the most reliable form of feeding. It lets you have an unlimited amount of items so you don't have to worry about having your foods come up, or deal with shops that are laggy or have 20 million banners in them. :P The only downside to SDB feeding is that a full SDB is a huge investment. The more items you have, the more consitently you will feed. Due to the alarming quantity of kad items, SDB feeding can cost A LOT. If you plan on stopping after 75, it's probably not worth your time. However, if you choose to keep feeding, I would highly recommend it. Since I started SDB feeding, I've been feeding a lot more. ^^ Most of my feeds now are SDB-ed. My SDB cost me an alarming amount that I won't write here. But personally, I think it's worth it. =)

Shop Wizard Feeding:

The third method of feeding is shop wizard feeding, or wiz-feeding. This is a very common method of feeding, but it can end up costing you a lot more NP than inventory or SDB feeding where you can control how expensive the items you buy are. People tend to overprice things to make more of a profit, so you can end up paying more than an item is worth for a feed, so be warned. However, you can get lucky and buy really inexpensive items, too. When wiz-feeding, my computer screen usually looks something like this:

What you do is, if you don't have an item in your inventory, you pick an item that a kad wants, and try to buy it using the shop wizard before someone else feeds it. Again, try to go for uncommon items, because you could easily spend a lot of NP on an item and just get beaten because someone else had it in their inventory or SDB. However, don't get too discouraged, because you can always inventory feed the missed item later, or sell it if you need the NP.

An important thing to remember while wiz-feeding is to always look at the price of the item you're buying. Don't buy anything if you're going to regret it later. Personally, I don't go for items over 7 or 8k (well, usually ;) ), but it's up to you to decide how much a feed is worth. The best way to prevent yourself from spending more than you want to is by simply not keeping too much NP out. However, if you are an avid rser like I am, this is impractical, and you'll just have to carefully watch the price of things.

Also note that you can only feed one kadoatie per rs, and you can't feed in a mini if you fed in a main unless they merge (or vice versa), unless you tie. There is a glitch that allows you to feed more, but abusing it is against the rules.

And that's about all the help I can give you for now. If you're polite, I'm sure one of the kind people at the kad boards would be happy to give you more advice.=)

But before you go to the kad board, there's a few important terms you should know.

Main=When most of the kads rs.

Mini=When 1 or just a few kads rs.

GLF=Good luck feeders, said at main time.

GLMF=Good luck mini feeders.

HN, CF=Had nothing, congrats feeders.

And that should just about do it.=) I hope this helped!

Link to me:

Lizzie's Kadoatery Guide
<a href=http://www.neopets.com/~Zythan>Lizzie's Kadoatery Guide</a>

<a href=http://www.neopets.com/~Zythan><img src=http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v33/psychoticcereal/guide_banner.gif></a>