When blackbirds fight back

'Err, I don't know how to get down.'

It’s all well and good watching vultures tear a distinctly deceased rabbit apart when there’s the safety of a nice, substantial wire fence between you and them, and being able to observe that the old cliché about nature being red in tooth and claw is true.

But such bloodiness is hardly limited to zoos. And here, in little old Hackney, there’s been a fair bit of it in recent days.

The periphery of the carpark has been, for the last week or so, an avian maternity ward.

Never before have there been so many bird families nursing young and watching over them as they fledge – it’s almost like the flats themselves: more obvious results of human fecundity than ever before.

But for cats, the presence of all these birds is like having Christmas, Easter, summer holidays and birthdays all arrive at once.

Back around 2006, when Boudi was about two and a half, and Mack and Trickie were still alive, we were all out in the garden one day, under a rather pallid sky.

The garden in those days was less patio and more just mess, overgrown with various short-lived and halfhearted efforts at anything resembling the horticultural arts.

The older cats were slumbering when, all of a sudden, Boudi jumped up at the rose bush and just as rapidly, dived in the direction of the flat, with something clearly in her mouth.

The Other Half grabbed her by the scruff and made her drop a small bird, then hoiked her inside and shut the door on her juvenile objections.

As the bird made to totter into a bush, Trickie came out of her reverie and realised that prey was around.

She was duly tossed inside too, to be rapidly followed by Mack, who, at around 14, had been the last to spot what was going on, and had started to slink toward the feathered abductee with a glint in his eye.

The Other Half, being rather more used to this sort of thing, said it was probably on its last legs and I’d need to put it out of its misery.

Great.

I got a spade, but it had no desire for a quick end, and instead kept hopping away in a manner that suggested that it was far from in agreement with his diagnosis.

After a few minutes, I decided to leave it – not least since I was, by then, being divebombed by a very angry robin.

Once inside, with the cats all complaining, the same robin took up a position atop the rotary drier and continued to ‘bark’ out a warning for the next hours.

In the meantime, other adult robins swooped in to help coax the fledgling first onto a chair, then onto the little table and from there into the thick pyracantha right next to it.

And then, until nightfall, they flew back and forth taking it food.

In the morning, they’d all gone, so presumably, the fledgling had regained its strength back and learned how to fly instead of simply falling conveniently within jaw range of a cat.

It was an extraordinary example of a family working to save their little one.

And that was the last time that we had any sort of bird incident.

Before that, there’d just been one occasion when Mack and his sister Mabel had ‘found’ a small bird and brought it into the flat, causing the feather to fly rather more than metaphorically.

That had been my first encounter with such an event and I had been all rather desperate and girly about it.

A certain more realistic steeliness had set in by the time we rescued the robin fledgling.

And that was that on the bird front – until last weekend.

Then, while we all sitting in the Sunday afternoon sun, as though summer had landed all of a sudden, Loki bombed in through the open gate and straight into the flat.

I got inside to find her in the hall with a small bird on the floor in front of her.

Boudi had materialised from somewhere and was reaching out a careful paw to see if it still moved.

We shooed them away and carefully picked it up and took it back outside.

It was breathing heavily but with no obvious signs of external injury. So The Other Half placed it in bushes and we hauled the pride inside, to the predictable objections.

It was only then that I realised that the noise of birds, which has been quite loud of late anyway, had been particularly frantic at that stage.

We checked later and the bird was gone. So, we allowed ourselves to think, another happy ending.

Unfortunately, just 24 hours later, it was Otto’s turn to race into the garden and behind a large pot. We went to see what she was up to and she shot into the flat, to be scragged quickly by The Other Half, who made her drop her prize.

It’s impossible to know for certain that it was the same bird, but it did look so – a sparrow fledgling. And this time it was most certainly deceased.

There were drops of blood on the paving stones – hardly surprising, given that Otto’s canines are so long that I half suspect she’s actually a Dracula cat.

We disposed safely of the bird and kept them in for the rest of the day, while the noise outside continued.

Since then, though, the weather and my illness meant that, until this weekend, the girls haven’t been outside.

Not that all this is remotely as one-sided as you might imagine.

Mr and Mrs Blackbird were, only a year since, squawking away in juvenile joy from the lithe silver birches in the carpark, and are now quite clearly a family unit.

No baby has been spotted, but Mr B has been seen rooting worms from the potager – and hectoring any cat (or human) who comes ‘too close’. Like some of our more colourful ’ackney residents, he was giving it large to all and sundry.

And in the week’s most extraordinary moment, he chased off Reggie, who had only reggiecide on his feline mind, dive-bombing the big ginger cat until he fled through the carpark gates.

So this weekend, whenever they’ve been out, we’ve been extra attentive, listening for any sound of avian anger.

Mind, Loki is clearly working to convince me that nominative determinism really exists.

It’s only just over a week since she managed to get up onto the balcony of the flat above ours – my back was briefly turned so I can only speculate on how she did it.

Once up there, the sense of accomplishment was soon replaced by another feeling.

“Loki, come down!”

“I don’t know how to!”

“Well … how did you get up there in the first place?”

“I can’t remember! I’m stuck!”

She paced rather frantically from one side of the small balcony to the other, meeping in an increasingly paniced way, before suddenly deciding that she could simply jump straight down, landing perfectly lightly, and then making her way into the flat as though nothing untoward had happened.

Yesterday, I found her on top of the canopy that stands next to one of the rear communal entrances, trying to see if she could see any birds in a tree next to it.

But hopefully, a rather quieter weekend is the sign that the fledglings have all fledged or perished in the attempt.

Before I sign off, Boudi wishes me, in the interests of balance, to point out that, a year or so after the robin affair, she actually caught three mice in the flat, over the course of a week or so, and left each one dead, but still in one piece, on the doormat so that, when we got home, we would be sure to find them.

The feline hunting instinct isn’t always a negative thing to be tempered as much as possible.

Christmas is for cats

Loki (top) and Otto, with shiny paper and a few balls.

‘Christmas is really for the children,’ or so many people claim.

In which case, do cats count too?

It’s certainly been an eventful festive season for our little pride, starting when Loki got herself lost.

She’d successfully chased the considerably larger Reggie out of the carpark behind our flat, and was rather obviously feeling chuffed with herself.

But by the time I’d returned from the shops, The Other Half was back inside, the door was still open, but she was nowhere to be seen.

Cue much calling and rattling of food tins. No sign.

After about half an hour of hunting – and increasing panic – The Other Half went upstairs on a communal staircase and opened a window to peer out from above.

Next door to our small block is an old pub that’s been converted into flats. He thought he spotted her on the metal stairs leading to the upper floors.

He sped out one way and I went the other, food tin and fork in hand.

There she was, underneath the metal stairs, hiding in a corner, bravado gone, now just thoroughly frightened.

Eventually he coaxed her out and through the gate, picking her up and pushing her back into the carpark, where she ran past me as I beat a tattoo on the tin and called her.

Past me, indeed, into the garden, straight into the flat and absolutely straight to the food bowl, where she started to gobble food.

“She’s going to bring that all back up,” I mused to The Other Half a few minutes later, as she continued to empty the bowl. But remarkably, she didn’t. Presumably, being frightened and lost gets the appetite going.

She’d also managed to get mud all over her paws and belly, so we toweled as much off as possible. I was wondering if we’d have to experience the joys of bathing a cat, but fortunately she completed the job excellently all by herself.

And then it was a case of flopping next to The Other Half on the sofa and not moving for the rest of the day. And the day after that.

But Christmas Day brought with it reasons to be active again.

The cats have had a few balls to play with for some time – light, ping pong balls are perfect. But they lose them rapidly beneath the furniture and then demand we get them out again.

Solution? A Christmas present of a bag of 150 orange ping pong balls.

Which we emptied onto the wooden floor all at once, to enormous feline confusion. Confusion, however, that was followed by gleeful play.

Boudicca isn’t entirely convinced, but The Kittens – who arrived at Christmas three years ago, so aren’t really kittens any more – love them.

It’s a sort of combination of dribbling skills and pinball. Although Otto has added a format to the game that’s entirely of her own making.

Having worked out that she can carry a ball around, she picks one up (using her front paws to lift it to her mouth) and then carries it to the mat inside the door to the garden.

Then she puts it down and waits until it either rolls away, before she charges after it, or until she decides to bat it away, and then charge after it.

But then, after a while of pinging it around, it will be brought back to the mat to start again. In the last week or so, the mat has changed to a piece of shiny wrapping paper, which is near the mat.

Wrapping paper is obviously another seasonal pleasure, to be dived on (this year’s new wooden floor means you can pretty much surf on it), torn at – and made into little tents to hide in.

Not that this is Otto’s only version of a formalised game.

Having realised, last Christmas, that she particularly loves ribbon, I bought a spool so we can cut lengths off for play.

And the ribbons ended up on the bed, which has a blanket box at the end of it.

The game, as it has evolved, means that when I’m sitting in bed with a book, Otto will sit on the blanket box and wait.

I’m supposed to take the longest piece of red ribbon and flick it towards her and then draw it slowly up the bed.

Sometimes she pounces quickly – sometimes she waits. And waits.

But she always returns to the blanket box to start the next round.

Cats have habits – they’ll patrol exactly the same area in exactly the same way, for instance – but neither The Other Half nor I have ever seen anything quite like this. It’s fascinating.

Mind, she will also sit and watch television (or a computer) for longer than any cat I’ve known either.

Boudi continues to be the household’s big clumsy girl. Presumably because she was so young when we got her (six and a half weeks) and because she moved into a household with two elderly cats, her social skills are not what they might be.

She gets her verbal signals all confused, growling and hissing when she’s actually playing. It still bemuses The Kittens, although they generally seem to regard her behaviour in a sort of ‘oh, it’s just Boudi’ way. They’d probably shrug if they could.

Mind, that’s when they’re not teasing her – karma, Boudi, given how you baited Trickie when you were a tiny thing?

Trickie, our Battersea rescue cat, who had spent most of her life with an elderly man who clearly liked a very hot home; who thought that she wasn’t a cat, but a small, elderly and rather genteel lady in a fur coat.

Trickie, who was nearly about to set records for the longest stay at the home; who beat her ‘cabin’ door when she saw us coming, drooled over the top of it at us, and faked the cat test, which is supposed to reveal whether a cat can get along with other cats.

Trickie, who was so grateful to be rescued from Stalag Luft Battersea, and who was then twice attacked in our garden by some hulking stranger cat, who was chased off by Boudi, paws a-whir as she hurtled after it, claws glistening in the morning light.

All of them leave you with stories and memories.

Not that our anthropological observations this last couple of weeks have been limited to the cats.

When we finally managed to get out for a walk yesterday, we discovered that squirrels make nests. Okay, I knew that they nested in hollow bits of trees, but had never realised that they actually make nests in the branches too.

We were in the park and there were squirrels everywhere – including the fattest one either of us have ever seen; sitting beneath a tree and munching its way through a whole pile of nuts, beady eye keeping a watch on anyone who got too close.

But not far away, there were squirrels running up and down the naked trees, carrying leaves to a big nest.

Since there was another rather large squirrel watching, we surmised that there’s a spot of Sciuridae pregnancy in the air.

And with a scattering of pink blossom on a tree further on, and crocuses already well on the way in our own little garden, it would seem that the seasons are well and truly in chaos.

No wonder it hasn’t felt much like Christmas anywhere but completely hidden away from the outside world.

Now we are one

Today, Loki and Otto are a whole year old.

Boisterous, cheeky, charming, manipulative, cuddly, devious: these are just a few of the adjectives that I could use to describe our youngest furry monsters.

But we were right: Boudicca has most certainly benefitted from having feline company – even though she possibly wouldn’t be the first to agree on that.

She’d had 16 months on her own after Mack died – we’d decided, on the basis of experience, that she should have some time to herself, to blossom in ways she hadn’t before. We decided – again on the basis of experience – that it’s best to introduce a kitten into a house with an established adult cat. The only question at the time was whether to get one kitten or litter mates – we opted for the latter so that, if Boudi had decided to give a newcomer a really torrid time, they’d have had sibling support.

Her ‘bored’ behaviour has all but disappeared – hardly any messing with the wooden tulips in the living room and not even much banging the sliding glass wardrobe doors in the bedroom: theses had become her default bored behaviours.

She even plays regularly with Loki – and very, very occasionally with Otto.

She has plenty to keep her occupied – particularly as all her assumptions about being Number 1 Household Cat are being rather mucked up by Otto’s considerations on the subject.

My little girl, having being named for Otto von Bismarck (when I still thought she was a he), is living up to her name rather well.

She may still love having big cuddles, but she never seems to have harboured any illusions about The Queen B’s status. However, unlike Boudi’s own tormenting of the late Trickie – who always considered herself a delicate old lady who wasn’t really a cat anyway but a small human in a fur coat who was put upon by cats – Otto’s undermining process is infinitely more subtle.

From very small she realised that sitting above Boudi and looking down at her would cause upset. So she set about doing it a lot.

Last night, after Boudi had hopped under the covers and was purring away in a tent created by The Other Half’s legs, Otto very carefully insisted on popping her face in to look, bringing forth irate growling and then Boudi’s rapid departure from the bed.

The Queen B’s old riposte would have been to smack the impudent kitten. But the impudent kitten in question long ago revealed that she could smack back. So now there is much chuntering and grumbling as Boudi becomes less and less obviously top cat; and doesn’t know what to do about it.

Even Loki, who is less clearly involved in the business of regime change, is undaunted. Having realised that she can now get on top of the bedroom bookcases, she half chases Boudi up there at night, into what was once the latter’s place of sanctuary and safety from junior furballs. No longer. Cue more feline grumbling.

One could almost believe in karma.

Not that this is surprising, if you take on board the idea (and it’s only an idea, with no real scientific basis) that a cat of a year old is, in human terms, about 15 or 16. In other words, Otto and Loki are teenagers.

Now, brownie points to all those who spotted the reference to AA Milne in the title of this post.

Being well brought-up children, my sister and I had AA Milne books at home. I don’t particularly remember the poem referenced in today’s title, but I do remember – and can quote chunks of – the following poem.

With which spurious link, I give you:

Disobedience

James James
Morrison Morrison
Weatherby George Dupree
Took great
Care of his Mother,
Though he was only three.
James James said to his Mother,
“Mother,” he said, said he;
“You must never go down
to the end of the town,
if you don't go down with me.”

James James
Morrison’s Mother
Put on a golden gown.
James James Morrison’s Mother
Drove to the end of the town.
James James Morrison’s Mother
Said to herself, said she:
“I can get right down
to the end of the town
and be back in time for tea.”

King John
Put up a notice,
“Lost or stolen or strayed!
James James Morrison’s mother
Seems to have been mislaid.
Last seen
Wandering vaguely:
Quite of her own accord,
She tried to get down
To the end of the town –
Forty shillings reward!”

James James
Morrison Morrison
(Commonly known as Jim)
Told his
Other relations
Not to go blaming him.
James James
Said to his Mother,
“Mother,” he said, said he:
“You must never go down to the end of the town
without consulting me.”

James James
Morrison’s mother
Hasn’t been heard of since.
King John said he was sorry,
So did the Queen and the Prince.
King John
(Somebody told me)
Said to a man he knew:
“If people go down to the end of the town, well,
what can anyone do?”

(Now then, very softly)
JJ
MM
WGDuP
Took great
C/o his M*****
Though he was only 3.
JJ said to his M*****
“M*****,” he said, said he:
“You-must-never-go-down-to-the-end-of-the-town-
if-you-don’t-go-down-with-ME!”

AA Milne

All up to scratch

One of the delights of coming to work each morning – and there are plenty – is finding out what has been delivered for you that day.

The problem, you see, is that if anything is due to be delivered to your home by a company other than Royal Mail, and you’re not in but they won’t deliver outside of work hours or only for lots of extra money at weekends, then it can be a nightmare to collect it (particularly if you don’t have a car) or have it delivered at a time that actually suits you.

People might complain about the postal service, but it is a service and it's a great deal easier to deal with and more geared to customer satisfaction than certain private delivery companies that I could name, which most certainly do not work on the basis that the provision of a service is paramount.

Thus the easiest thing is often to have things delivered to work, in the knowledge that you can guarantee that someone will be able to sign for whatever it is.

Today, that meant a rather large – and heavy – box containing a swanky new cat scratching post.

The old one had done sterling service for around 10 years, but when its very aim is to be scratched, it isn’t going to last for ever. It was tatty enough as it was when, on Saturday morning, as The Other Half and I reclined in bed, drinking coffee and with me contemplating the weekend’s fodder, a loud crash was heard from next door in the living room, speedily followed by two kittens racing into the bedroom.

Otto in particular was looking back though the doorway with that famous feline expression that combines total surprise with a slightly shifty: ‘it woz nuffink to do wiv me, Guv’, which always provides a quick indicator of just exactly who it was to do with.

A visit to the living room quickly revealed the problem: a glass bowl, which had been sitting quietly on top of one of our lower book shelves, minding its own business, for some years, holding white gravel, sand and some long-dead cacti, was now on the floor, having clearly decided to commit harikari – out of boredom, one assumes.

The glass was unbroken, but the contents were everywhere – not least, all over the scratching post, which stood below it. Tidying up later, it became obvious that this was going to be the least easy thing to clean up, simply because most of the material on the bases was long since rather ragged and the dirt had got under it and into the carpet itself.

After thinking about replacing it for some months, but doing nothing about it, it seems that Otto had decided to force our hand by taking matters into her own paws.

We dismantled the thing, threw it out and then trawled the net for a replacement. And so here it is.

The timing is rather good too: two weeks on Thursday, the kittens will be a year old. So it’s an early birthday present.

It remains to be seen whether Boudi deigns to be interested in it – it hasn’t been high on her agenda since the kittens discovered it, just a matter of a couple of days after their arrival last December.

Loki and Otto thoroughly enjoyed the old one, playing on it (and playing with the little ball that hung from it), fighting on and around it and sleeping on it (and in a 'furry' tunnel that hung from part of it). Scratching posts are far more than just a post for scratching – they're combined gym and entertainment centres for cats.

I admit that I am looking forward to seeing their response to the new one: how long will it take before one or other of them masters the little ladder? Will they clamber through the hole in the middle? Will they like the fact that it's apparently impregnated with catnip?

Ummm. Catnip. Or cat drugs, as we know them. Not all cats respond to catnip and they usually have to be over six months of age before they respond.

Mack adored the stuff and would go completely bonkers for it. His sister, Mabel, was never remotely as interested and neither was Trickie, who followed her. We brought some home from the Columbia Road flower market once – six plants to put into the garden. Before we'd even got the garden door open, Mack had hurled himself into the bag and was rolling madly all over them. Amazingly, they survived that and recovered once they'd been planted out.

Apparently catnip is the only drug known that has two opposite effects, depending on how it's consumed. Sniff it, and cats get a high. Eat it, and the opposite happens.

When we open the box tonight, we shall find out just what they all think.

Getting in the swing of summer

It feels – finally – as though summer is really here. Glorious sunshine, headily azure skies and heat to warm the marrow of the bones – there's no mistaking it any longer.

With the signs set for a hot weekend, The Other Half and I forewent the pleasures of an evening in the staff bar on Friday and pottered down to John Lewis for a bit of seasonal retail therapy. Specifically, a pair of metal-framed 'deckchairs' and a new braai, since the previous one had started to collapse. still, it had only cost around £20 from a local Turkish shop and had lasted us some years.

All that meant some work in our garden. I suppose it's roughly 15' by about 12' – can't be much more than that – but it's such a precious space. The Other Half spent Saturday de-cluttering it. First, the old braai – a tin box on legs – went out. Then he finally got around to bashing a garden bench into pieces so that we could carry it out and decant it into the communal bins.

We've had that bench for years, having bought it from a small shop on Hackney Road and, when we got it home and mostly errected, found out that it was missing two struts. It was one of those affairs with cast iron ends and wooden slats. For whatever reason, we never got around to going back to the shop and either demanding the struts or our money back.

So it has occupied space against once fence for years: always wobbly and getting wobblier with every passing season. It was long past our being able to sit on it. We talked of getting rid of it some years ago, but Trickie, one of our cats at the time (and as neurotic a cat as we've had) loved it, so we left it there.

But Trickie is long gone. And in the last week, one of the wooden slats fell off. It was a rallying call.

We'd also had a little table and two folding chairs in our tiny space, but both chairs had finally given up the ghost. So we have now simply shoved the table out of the way, leaving the patio clear for the new 'deckchairs'.

And once that was sorted, the plan for the rest of the weekend was really rather obvious. Sitting in the sun with plenty of chilled water and a book.

And then there was food. Obviously a braai was arranged – that was for Sunday.

But for Saturday, I picked up salmon fillets to poach, plus good new potatoes (still Jerseys), fresh garden peas and fine beans.

And then I made the first aioli of the season to serve with it.

This Catalan version of mayo is an utter delight. When I'd made it, I had a struggle to stop myself scoffing the stuff by the spoonful as it set off an orgy of flavour in my mouth.

Don't believe all the stories about emulsions being difficult – all you need to do is take your time.

So, take one – or more – garlic cloves. Peel and crush, then blend with some coarse salt until you get a paste.

Pop that into a large jug and add the yolk of a very fresh egg. Then whisk until you've got a lovely, stiff mixture.

Now, here's the only real trick: as you keep whisking, start adding some good virgin oil – very, VERY slowly: you really need to just drip it in at first. If anything, your mix should stiffen even further. Okay, it takes a few minutes, but keep going – slowly. When you've eventually got something that looks like a really good, stiff, golden mayo, you can add the oil a little faster until you get the consistency that you want.

Decant it into a pot and stick in the fridge – it'll keep for up to a week, although that's only if you can resist the temptation to use it much much quicker!