HALIFAX—A Halifax app developer’s simple birthday request has resulted in the largest single-day fundraiser in the history of the Nova Scotia SPCA.

On Saturday, Christian Selig celebrated his 26th birthday. The creator of the Apollo for Reddit app spread the word that he’d decided to donate all proceeds from the sale of his iOS app on his birthday to the Nova Scotia SPCA. Apollo for Reddit is an app that makes browsing Reddit on mobile easier and more user friendly.

Last year the Dalhousie University graduate raised $5,000 for the same organization. He’d set a $10,000 goal for this weekend, so when he got the final tally of app sales from the Apple Store on Sunday morning, he was stunned — more than $25,500 was raised directly from Saturday’s app sales.

In addition to app proceeds, he pledged to donate $1 for every retweet about the fundraiser via his @apolloreddit Twitter account. Those retweets amounted to more than $860. This was added to donations from people who already had the app or didn’t need or want it. They donated close to $1,000 via Paypal.

His overall birthday fundraiser donation to the SPCA was $27,355.

“The way Apple’s reporting system goes is you’re kind of in the dark until the next day and then they kind of throw you the amount. So there’s no live counter. It was very much from reading the responses (Saturday), it seemed to be doing really well,” Selig said in an interview.

“I thought, hopefully we beat that $10,000. Then I was just kind of refreshing the website the next morning hoping they’d sent out some stats for the previous day and oh my God, yeah. I almost fell out of my seat because instead of being able to gradually build up to it, it just kind of hit me like a boxing glove.”

Taylor Mundy, the Nova Scotia SPCA’s provincial fund development co-ordinator, described Selig as having a heart of gold. She said last year when he raised just over $5,000 for their organization, they were on cloud nine.

So when Selig reached out on Sunday to share the $27,355 figure, Mundy described herself as “completely overwhelmed with the love.”

“To be completely honest, I broke down and cried when he told me the amount that was raised. It is truly going to make a huge impact for our animals,” she said.

The warm weather means the SPCA is currently dealing with what it calls kitten season. Mundy said this is the time of year when the province’s shelters become flooded with abandoned, injured and orphaned kittens.

“Along with their cuteness, they bring a lot of additional expense on our already very tight resources, so this is going to be huge for those itty bitty kitties,” she said.

The funds will primarily be used for veterinary care and to help combat the costs associated with kitten season across Nova Scotia. Already this year, Mundy said the provincial SPCA has spent $719,000 on veterinary care to nurse sick, injured and abused animals back to health.

“We’re proudly no kill and will tackle difficult medical and cruelty cases to ensure that every animal is safe, happy and healthy,” she said. “But antibiotics, surgeries, emergency medical treatment, it’s all very expensive. Especially where we’re a charity with no government funding for our shelters.”

Selig’s birthday initiative marks the largest single-day donation in the organization’s history. Mundy said it was also extraordinary because he led the fundraiser completely on his own.

“He was a leader and really got people to kind of rally with him and because of that they’re saving lives,” Mundy said.

“We just want to say thank you to Christian. He raised over $27,000, and 27,000 thank yous would never be enough for what he’s done.”

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Selig said his Apollo app has been downloaded more than 1 million times since its October 2017 launch. The app is free, but offers in-app purchases for additional pro or ultra features.

“It’s kind of like a car wash, like how you can get supreme or regular or whatever,” he explained.

He believes many users of the free version decided to take the plunge and upgrade on Saturday to help a worthy cause.

A self-described animal lover, Selig said he chose to support the SPCA because he and his girlfriend’s two cats, Ruby and Hugo, came from the Dartmouth SPCA. When he learned last year about the existence of kitten season, it further solidified his decision.

“I’m just a really big fan of what they do for animals. It was an easy choice,” he said.

When asked how many app downloads or purchases he’d expect on an average day, Selig wouldn’t give specific numbers. But he said the $25,500 figure “comfortably blew away every other day.”

“It was far and above. When you say it’s hard for the average Joe to comprehend that amount in a day, it’s hard for the Joe who built the app to understand that as well,” he laughed.

Although it’s a year away, Selig plans to create a similar initiative to celebrate his 27th birthday in 2020.

Yvette d’Entremont is a Halifax-based reporter focusing on health. Follow her on Twitter: @ydentremont

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