Category: Cats

Autumn cats

I was really weary from the heat this summer, and some work appeared when I felt a little cooler. So I haven’t renewed this web site for almost two months. (Which isn’t to say that’s a good excuse…)

In this past summer, our cat Kyoku became a completely inside cat, and there were some changes in the world of the outside cats, too.

First of all, our neighbour’s cat Ryo (a male cat; we used to call him Boss Hana) started to show up at our house frequently. We want to say to him ‘Hey you. Do you go back to your own home sometimes?’ Now, he knocks on our window screen. Sometimes he lies down for a long time on the trash can by our kitchen door, or on the garden slippers, like Kyoku used to do. It seems Kyoku still has a good relationship with Ryo, so he is busy following the boss here and there, from window to window in the house, when Ryo-kun appears.

A small mother cat, black and white spotted Moku-chan, started to appear. One day in May, she gave birth to three kittens: a black and white spotted one, one with dark stripes, and a black one. Three months later, maybe after she separated from her kids, we started to see Moku-chan and the kittens separately. She first appeared to get food left over from Ryo-kun or Shiro-chan. Such a small body, and she ate until she threw up: we thought ‘It’s understandable. She is probably looking for food for her kids very hard.’ However, we were wrong: it seems she didn’t want to miss the chance to get a lot of food. She usually asks for food with a loud miaow.

Watching the cats, it seems Ryo-kun is very nice to females or kids, so he never chases Moku-chan away; she who eats all the food in the bowl by herself. However, unfortunately, it seems Shiro-chan will never get along with Moku-chan. The two women are often fighting.

Maybe Shiro-chan thinks something’s up: it seems her visits to our house became less. Of course she’s still waiting for food in silence on the shed roof whenever we notice…

Aiming for these cats’ leftovers, a black kitten appears. We call it simply Kuro (black); maybe it’s one of Moku-chan’s kids. We don’t know which sex it is yet. It usually hangs out around an empty house beside our house; but where did the other two kittens go? (Actually, Icchan also sometimes appears from somewhere.)

Some nights ago, the grey-striped family appeared at our house from somewhere. There were two adults and two kittens. The kittens’ faces were cute, like Kyoku’s younger time, so we fed some dry food to the kittens. ‘What should we do… They are cute but – four more cats?’ So we thought; but we haven’t seen the parents since then. We guess that one of those two kittens is probably the kitten who we see playing with Kuro-chan. (We call it Kogu-chan.) Only one left: where did the other members of the family go?

There are a few male cats who always fight with Ryo-kun at night.
Easygoing Kyoku is living in our house as usual.
Without knowing the changes in the world of outside cats…

Anyway, who is the father of Moku-chan’s kittens!?

–YS, 8 October 2005

8 October 2005