Good morning from Chicken Paradise Hawaii! Another blue sky today.
Morning rounds
Good morning, Poppy. Brownie looks busy. Suzume, your face is scary. Pro Wrestler, you really are a girl. Echiseana, your face is scary too. Salaryman, laying an egg? There it is — good job! Yukinko, you’re so round. Okki-chan, your face is scary as well. The nest boxes are completely full today.
Then I opened up the chicks’ area. One tiny black chick we call Niji (“rainbow”) is doing fine — but no sunbathing, and no walk, thank you. Another hen insisted on sitting on eggs. You don’t have to lay eggs, and you don’t have to sit on them — just go enjoy your day! Breakfast is over there.
Our family has grown
Today I have a surprise announcement. We have a new family member: a cat! Look at that lovely face.
She was living in the warehouse at the store where I always buy feed, with her mother and siblings. A warehouse isn’t a great place for kittens, and they were looking for homes, so I decided to take her in. Another sibling had already gone to someone else, and I meant to take the last two, but one went missing in the warehouse — so it’s just this girl.
This is my first cat. My mom always had cats, so there are cat experts around me, but I’m new to it myself. She’s about a month and a bit old, still tiny, and she bites a lot for a cat.
Some people might wonder why a chicken farm needs a cat. Actually, there are lots of other cats around the farm, and lots of rats. I hoped that if this area becomes her territory, other cats might stay away — and that she might catch rats. (She just scratched my face.) And I’ve always been interested in cats.
Meet Natsu
For a long time she had no name. When people asked, I’d joke with the opening line of a famous Japanese novel: “I am a cat. As yet I have no name.” So we borrowed the author’s surname, Natsume. “Natsu” sounded cute — and since we found her in a warehouse (soko in Japanese), her silly full name became Soko Natsume. Natsu for short.
She has gotten very used to people. At first she mewed nonstop, but lately she purrs instead. She won’t say hello to the world yet, but she spends the whole day walking around the farm, and she looks like she’s having a great time.
That’s our new family member. Please give her a warm welcome!