Cats of Maui
I come to Maui often. When I do I usually stay in the west coast. Kaanapali, Lahaina, or Napili areas works best for my family. This time around I am spending spring break in Kaanapali. The cool thing about Kaanapali is its world famous beach and the vibrant walk trail. I especially like the Kahekili beach park, where the pin for this post is pointing to. This is a public beach park. A classic Hawaiian beach, with excellent golden sand and a perfect grassy lawn with coconut trees with just enough shades.
But wait! This post is not about the beach or the park or Maui in general. It is about cats. I am not particularly fond of cats :) I have been fighting my kids for half a decade or more not to have a pet cat in the house. Sometimes I feel my feeble resistance is going to be overrun, but then I claw myself back with my fingernails! But here my kids are in cat heaven!
I keep saying we can just keep coming back to here and there will be all the cats you need! They are right here along the trail, and you don’t even have to take care of them. That’s the park above with the coconut trees blowing in the trade winds, and there’s the path along which all the cats can be found. Please don’t think for a minute that these cats are not taken care for. They can be public cat, but they are well fed by the tourists. I almost hate to call them stray cats, so I won’t! You see my younger daughter is taking good care for one of them.
Further along the trail my younger daughter found these two sitting side-by-side, and she liked to name them night and day respectively, which I thought is fairly apt. We saw here that they actually have a food and water bowl under the bushes. Looks like they live here and resort community and/or the tourists take care of them.
The trail goes from Kahekili beach park from the south to Honopilani park to the north. Views are spectacular along the way. The beach trail does extend many more miles to the south as well past a golf course, then Sheraton Maui property to Whaler Mall, over there it is called the Kaanapali beach walk. I still like the northern segment of the walk because it’s more open and with gorgeous view of the ocean with both Lanai and Molokai and of course the cats.
~~~ embed:1635115481580589058 twitter metadata:MTM3MzYzMTEwMjg0NjM0NTIxOXx8aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dGVyLmNvbS8xMzczNjMxMTAyODQ2MzQ1MjE5L3N0YXR1cy8xNjM1MTE1NDgxNTgwNTg5MDU4fA== ~~~
The rewards earned on this comment will go directly to the people( @xoxois, @intoy.bugoy ) sharing the post on Twitter as long as they are registered with @poshtoken. Sign up at https://hiveposh.com.
This is a lovely cat post and your daughter seems to be a lovely, kind person.
When I read this I thought of articles I had read about the endangered bird populations on different Hawaiian islands. In some cases the birds are destroyed by rodents. In some cases they are destroyed by aggressive ants. And in other cases, Maui for one, they are endangered by cats.
I love cats. My family has been helping homeless cats for years by spaying, neutering, sheltering and feeding. So the discussion about Maui cats caught my attention. There is an ongoing debate on Maui (just read about it after reading your blog) between bird advocates who want to kill all the cats and humane society/cat advocates who want to foster a trap neuter release (TNR) program. I don't have to tell you which side I'm on :)
Hope you don't mind this rather long comment. I didn't know Maui had all those cats. They do seem to be very well fed😇
You know, now that you have mentioned it, I am coming to Maui almost every other year, for the last 13 years, and I have never seen this much cat population on this trail. It is something that alarmed me subconsciously I guess because I didn’t know about the native birds. Something does seem out of balance
"Community cats" seem to be becoming a more commonplace thing to see around the world. I love cats (even helped care for a feral cat colony near my work, many years ago) but feral cats only "work" if the community has a "trap, neuter, release" program... otherwise the populations can really get out of hand and become a nuisance.
You can usually tell because they either clip a little notch out of the tip of one ear or clip the tip of it off; looks like the cat was in a fight, but it's actually a marker.
Those are some pretty healthy looking cats in your photos, so I'd like to think they have a caretaker and don't just depend on tourist handouts.
Surprised as you might be, they actually eat cat food. I have seen empty cat food can by the plenty in nearby trash bins. They look better cares for compared to many house cats
Congratulations, your post has been added to Pinmapple! 🎉🥳🍍
Did you know you have your own profile map?
And every post has their own map too!
Want to have your post on the map too?
They are very friendly with children, I even wonder about it, they are not vicious with children even if they are treated in a bad way. It's different for adults, they can just stick out their claws, but they are cute animals.
These are extremely friendly and used to human interactions
Aaarggh. the beauty of nature. Such a nice, quiet, and peaceful place. My girlfriend also loves cats so much. He named his little one Snow.
What a beautiful cat who patiently displays this. And the places there I think are also very interesting for us to visit.How are you today friends,Hopefully you are always in good health and well. @azirco
Cats and beaches actually go well together, but I only found out this year. Because the beaches here in BD are always crowded, so these animals don't get enough attention and they're usually scared too.
Last year though, since we had our own beach area with fairly less people, the cats weren't shy. Slowly we found out that it was actually a family of 5 or 6 cats haha, they became so comfortable with us that even the little kittens came out to say hello haha.
Since writing this post I have researched the subject a little bit. Maui have 500,000 cats and they are a danger to the native bird population. The county is trying their best to keep the cat population under control
That's surely a big number, hopefully they're not using any harsh methods to keep the cat population under control.
Maui seems very friendly with cats, they look very healthy and happy, you can see the bodies of the cats are very big, their fur looks very healthy even though they don't have a home.
I like cats, they are beings with an extraordinary energy. It's good that they are cared for there and are free.
How nice your little girl who caresses them and loves them.
In the community where I live there are also many cats that live there and people feed them and they can live with us. There are always people who are bothered by them but they also have the right to be there.
Beautiful beaches
Greetings and happy day
I have never been such a fan of cats, they always seem to want to be alone... no one will change my mind about dogs being better.
Although I must admit that when they are cats "used to human presence" they become much more cuddly/adorable to me. I find it quite a strange combination to see cats near a beach haha, I guess they've been living there all their lives and are comfortable with that environment. Despite living on the beach, it is amazing how well cared for and well-fed they are. I think that's another plus, they can simply "take care of themselves more" than dogs, although I don't doubt that tourists can feed them too :D
@azircon I wish you well on your spring break in Kaanapali, whose beaches are very famous with spectacular walking trails. It would be very interesting to do yoga in the Kahekili beach park. From Venezuela I wish you success in such a beautiful publication, and I am grateful for your constant visits to mine. Greetings.
oooo, so many cats. I had no idea Maui had so many cats! Would love to visit. Thanks for sharing, @azircon
Annabelle 😼