Oji

I currently don’t garner a possession of any animals which to an extent is littered with its own unfortunate circumstance. Though I could regale you with a story of a remarkable animal that has made such a massive impact on my life that no other animal could fill his shoes. In some cases literally.

Growing up in a spread out farmland where there were clusters of homes between fields creating micro neighborhoods there would be strays that spring up from lost pets all the way to farm hands. I don’t remember how we got him, whether he decided that we would take care of him, he was an honest rescue, or a chicken farmer paid us to take him because he didn’t want to kill him. It never mattered to me how he showed up but that he was there.

As a tiny kitten we threw around some names and ended up sticking with Oji which is the Japanese word for Prince. He did his best to fit that name as well. Growing up before we got him neutered he prowled but was playful. The only thing that gave him a freight in his youth was a German Shepard that we fostered for a little bit and it made it hard to get him back in the house. He would bat the foster pugs around though. It was the only time I saw him scared of anything.

After pawning the dog off to my grandparents the cat returned and it was like we were never a part. He even helped with the free range chicken rearing. Over the years I learned to what extent that he actually helped. Right when the sun would start to go down he would sit and count the chickens that were returning to the coop. At a certain time he would hunt down the ones that didn’t come to roost in time and bat them out of their hideaway nests and usher them back to the flock.

Once we realized that we let him outside more often and he would disappear. Every once in a while he would bring halves of animals and as he got bigger they got bigger. Field mice, squirrels, and birds is what he started with. But that was just practice for him that led into the predators of the chickens that we would lose them too.

It didn’t take long that he became more like a panther than a house cat. It woke my father in the middle of the night when Oji was out one night and didn’t come back in to sleep with the family. He could hear the chickens and some animals clattering and shrieking one night. Grabbing his gun and wearing his lounge wear and boots he trudged up the hill to save the chickens. Turns out that cat Oji had already killed the racoon that got into the barn and the only thing harmed was just one egg that the racoon was trying to steal.

That was the moment we knew he was helping. He was as much of the family and working hand as anyone else and always on duty. I even remember one day my father was at work late so it was my turn to get the eggs and Oji escorted me around because it was chicken time. I was collecting the eggs in the basket and some of the chickens were just sitting in the coops warming the eggs in hopes that they would one day hatch.

I started on the end closest to the door picking the eggs and reaching blindly under some chickens who paid me no mind as to what I was doing. Oji started near the middle battling gently at one of the chickens in the top roost in an attempt to get it to move. I told him not to bother the chicken but Oji became slightly more panicked as I got closer to his side of the roost.

Before I got to that chicken he finally ran out of patience and reached under the chicken and pulled out two feet of black snake. Throwing it to the ground he pounced before the snake even knew what was going on and removed the head cleanly from the body. I never heard of a cat being able to handle snakes before, which is why they jump at cucumbers, or even kill something so quickly. They usually play around. Not Oji. There was time for work and then there was play time. This was a work moment.

Ever since then I would randomly stumble on him outside prowling random creatures thinking my families full sized chickens or the neighbors bantam hens were something worth taking. He was there to make sure it was their last mistake. Even if it was something as large as a coyote. He was the reason we no longer saw them prowling around within his hunting grounds.

Before moving out I even saw a comical moment of when he was stalking a small pack of deer out in our field. Seeing a little black dart speeding across a field quickly gaining on the large bounding deer only to miss by jumping too early and not calculating for the deer to hop the fence over our property line. I am sure he would have done his best to kill anything that he deemed a threat to the property and its occupants. And he was good at it too.

Genocidal maniac aside he always had time for cuddling and pets. He loved the role of a house cat. Even with all his fighting and farm work aside he would never come home with scars, scratches, or missing parts of fur. Him never being even touched by his targets was part of the reason it took so long for us to catch on to the fact that he was moonlighting as a bouncer to the chicken coop.

I wish I could say this ended with a happy ending or with closure even. I moved out of my parents house. They soon moved out of my childhood house into the city. One day they let him out as they would normally. Him looking for duty and work was frightened by the one thing that would scare him. The neighbor’s barking German Shepherd. He bolted away and just never came back.

We drove the streets looking for black cats skulking or even plastered to the pavement. We checked the shelters and even a few of the neighbors. We checked for months and could never find that little panther dressed in black with the most formal white tuft on his chest. We gave up hoping beyond all hope that he just found some old lady that would take care of him and keep him safe. Not that he needed guarding but just to help our ease of mind. He was a smart cat and deserved a good retirement.

The worst part is he would still be alive today. He wouldn’t have left such large footprints that no other animal has been able to fill since. And for now I feel that he has turned into a legend of the Ozarks one day. The small mountain lion that killed anything but livestock. A protector of the frail in the mountains. Even though I know that he is just known within my family.