by Luna Challis
My friends the Kangaroos would go to the troughs to drink. But one day I saw a Koala drinking from the trough. This was very unusual. Koalas normally don’t drink at all, but just get their water from the gum leaves they eat. The leaves were much drier than usual and even the Koalas could not get enough water from the leaves.
Then a long way from any water trough I saw something extraordinary. A Koala came down from a tree and went up to a man who had a bike. The man and his companion had stopped to have a drink from the little plastic bottles they had. The Koala went to the man and they shared the water. Koalas generally stay away from Humans, but this one must have been so thirsty that its thirst overcame its fear.
The man’s companion took a picture on her mobile phone. She said that they could send it to the local Mount Barker newspaper. The next week the extraordinary photograph appeared in The Courier newspaper.
Other animals were also in trouble. Possums were so weak that they were falling from the trees. Kind Humans were trying to help them. There was a lady from the Native Animal Network who lives near Charleston who was trying to save the Possums. I also recognised two of the vet nurses who work for Dr. Motter. Humans were doing their best to save the native animals.
Facebook
Facebook is an internet site where Cats and other animals can keep in touch with each other without much fear of being eaten. Facebook was invented by Mark Zuckerberg. He is too clever to be a Human, so he must be at least partly Cat.
I have over 2000 friends on Facebook, but I always want more. If you would like to be my friend, please send me a friend request at my Facebook profile.
Many of my friends on Facebook are Cats, but I am not prejudiced, not even against Humans: some of my best friends are Human. Whatever species you are, I would like to be your friend.
Of course to me, Cats are most important, so I have been giving the word “Cat” a capital letter. However, to show that I am not prejudiced, I have also used capital letters for the lower animals like humans.
The Feral Cat
Although I am friends with a lot of Cats on Facebook, I don’t always get on very well with Cats in the real world and I generally avoid them until I get to know them. I only have a couple of Cat friends.
So when I saw a big Cat when I was out late one night I watched it cautiously, hoping it wouldn’t see me. I have very good night vision, much better than Michael’s. I don’t know how good Mark Zuckerberg’s night vision is. The large Cat was black. If Michael was there he would not have been able to see it at all in the dark.
The huge Cat saw me! It started to come aggressively towards me. I ran! I have some simple tricks to escape from Dogs. Normally I climb a tree and wait till the Dog has gone. But this was a Cat. It would be able to climb trees as well. If I had been closer to home I would have gone and called for help from Michael.
I headed for a creek. I am a good jumper, even if Michael tells me I am fat. I knew that I could just about jump over the water in the creek. Perhaps the giant Cat would not be able to get over.
The trick didn’t work. The gigantic Cat could jump better than me! The gargantuan Cat was getting closer and it looked enormous; 20 pounds of hissing, spitting, biting, scratching fury!
The bad Cat was fitter and faster than me. I was in trouble. I thought about getting help from my friends. Michael was too far away. Marjorie and Erik were in Sweden. I didn’t even know how to get there. The kind farmer would still be asleep. The nice Cows he milked were at the opposite end of the farm. If I could get among them they would frighten the evil Cat away.
Then I thought about friends who were closer. The mob of Kangaroos was nearby. With the last of my strength I put on a spurt of speed. I reached the Kangaroos just ahead of the satanic Cat. It was just starting to get light and the Kangaroos were awake. Soon they would get up and go and start grazing. I jumped into the mother Kangaroo’s pouch with my friend the Joey Kangaroo.
The terrible Cat ran into the middle of the mob. All the Kangaroos jumped to their feet. They didn’t like the awful Cat anymore than I did, but they are much bigger than me. If the big male Kangaroo could have got hold of the appalling Cat he would have torn it apart with his back legs. The dreadful Cat knew this and left very quickly. The last time I saw it, it was cowering up a tree. It must have known that Kangaroos don’t climb trees.
I stayed in the pouch until the Kangaroos had reached their grazing grounds. When it was properly light I went home and spent a couple of hours curled up on Michael’s lap while he did things on the computer.
Michael gave me some nice food, and I told him about my adventure. I don’t think he understood what I was saying; he doesn’t speak much Cat.
The Vegetables
Michael gives me very nice food. At least he usually does, but one day he opened the little sachet of Cat food while I was waiting impatiently. He put it the food onto my little plate. Instead of the Tuna he usually gives me, this was vegetables. I looked at Michael and complained loudly. Michael can’t understand much Cat, but he understood me that time.
What imbecile expected Cats to like vegetables? No doubt a Pig would have been grateful for it. Michael gave me some proper Cat food.
Afterwards I posted a status on Facebook about it. Several of my friends were very sympathetic.
The Bad Boy
One of our Humans is named Steve. He is a bad boy, and even wrote a book called “A Bad Boy”. It is not that he does anything wrong; in fact he gives me very nice food if Michael is away. He always speaks nicely to me and will let me in when I want to come in.
But he has bad ideas. In his book, my birth place, the unsinkable land base, HMAS Cerberus sinks.
This idea is bad enough, but he has an even worse idea. He wants to replace all the Cats in Australia with Quolls!
But even this is not the worst of his ideas. He even talks about reintroducing Tasmanian Devils into Australia. These Dog-like animals will follow Cats and steal the food that they have caught with great effort. At least they are very slow creatures that cannot climb trees, so I will have no trouble getting away from them.
Still, the Devils will chase off the feral Cats, so they can’t be all bad.
Tragedy
Now I come to the saddest thing that has happened to me. Just writing about it reminds me how heartbreaking it was, but without including the sad parts of my life as well as the happy ones, this autobiography would be very incomplete.
One day I saw my brother, Phantom playing with one of the funny animals without any legs and a forked tongue. That afternoon, Phantom died for no reason that I could see. Phantom used to bully me a bit, but he was my brother and I loved him. He was also my best friend. Michael is also a good friend even if he doesn’t always appreciate the presents I give him, but he is a Human. He is a very nice Human, and I am certainly no speciest, but of course even a very clever Human like Michael cannot be compared with a Cat.
The Plague
The spring and summer of 2010 to 2011 were much wetter than usual and the Mice kept breeding. Phantom was dead and Michael is no good at Catching Mice so I had a hard job keeping the area free of Mice. In the autumn when one of the farmers was sowing Oats, I could see what looked like a moving blanket behind the machine that was putting the seeds into the ground. Millions of Mice were trailing behind the farmers; digging up the seeds as the farmers put them into the ground.
There were so many Mice that they had eaten all the food that had grown during the spring and summer, and the Mice were starving. The winter of 2011 has had some very cold nights and the Mice are dying of the cold as well as the lack of food. The Mice were stupid to breed so much. They should have limited their population to a sustainable level.
Death of a Friend
One very early morning I was out with the mob of Kangaroos. They were grazing while I was watching for mice. Then they started off. I was worried when they came to the On
kaparinga Valley Road. This is a quite busy road and I am very careful how I cross it.
Near where the Kangaroos crossed the road there is a crest where drivers cannot see the road very far ahead. A car came over the crest at ninety miles an hour and struck the Kangaroo. The driver lost control of the car and went on the other side of the road. A truck was coming the other way, and only avoided a head on collision with the car by leaving the road.
The Humans were all right, but the poor Kangaroo was dead.
The Rabbits
Although I have never killed a native mammal, I consider the introduced ones to be fair game, as long as they are not too big. The Dingo is Australia’s own Feral Dog, having been introduced as a domestic animal about 3,500 years ago, but they are too big for me to hunt. Fortunately there are no Dingos in Charleston.
I sometimes watch the Rabbits. I rarely try to catch one; the adults are a bit too big for me, but one day I caught a nice young one and gave it to Michael. I was very careful not to hurt it.
I often give Michael little presents. I have given him several mice and sometimes other animals. Perhaps one day I will catch one of the funny animals with a forked tongue but no legs and take it inside to give to Michael. I think he would like it.
I am only four years old, but I have had a lot of experiences. I think I will write a sequel to my autobiography, but I have not decided of a title. Perhaps ‘Tails of Luna’ (I have a very nice tail.), or maybe ‘The Luna Eclipse’. When I am on Michael’s lap and get in the way so he cannot see the computer screen, he calls it a ‘Luna Eclipse’.
Michael thinks I have delusions of grandeur, but I don’t have delusions: I am grand.
If you have any good suggestions for a title for my next book, message me on my Facebook.
A Bad Boy by Steve Challis
Ali the Peacemaker by Steve Challis
ExtraSolar Menace by Steve Challis
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence by Steve Challis
The Bad Boy Quadrilogy by Steve Challis
War and Space by Steve Challis
The Local War by Steve Challis
The Science of The Bad Boy Quadrilogy by Steve Challis
The Old Firm by Richard F. Challis
Time and Chance by Richard F. Challis
When Angels Travel by Richard F. Challis
Interludes by Richard F. Challis
Joey in the Outback by Richard F. Challis