This year's quota of kittens

 

A friendly feral cat visits once a day, eats a chapatti or whatever else is on offer. Brushes against the legs of anyone who is comfortable with the feline touch. It has been going for the last few years. Every year she brings her kittens, leaves them in the courtyard, goes out to hunt for rats and squirrels. The rest of the dietary supplements are taken care of by her foster human family. This morning her three children have arrived to fill up this year's quota. It's sad news for the garden lizard couple who has the entire courtyard to them. They would spend most of the time on the ground. The kittens are enough grown up to maul them to a funny chameleon pickle. They better beware. The tiny hunters are snoopy and are enquiring every nook corner. Suddenly they spring in the air and snap up some little house lizard baby or some complacent cricket from the wall. There are nests: squirrel, silverbill, spooted munia  and tailorbird couples have their nests among the clump of trees in the unkept garden of this countryside nondescript poet. Obviously the bird parents are panicked. The squirrels are continuously tiktikking and chitchitting. The tiny chits of tigers roam the little forest with their typical hunter's attitude and poise. Full of caution and opportunism. One of them was seen eyeing the silverbill couple with such amusing greed that I burst out laughing. Well, it's nature's play. The cat has timed her delievery for this time when there would be enough rodents to hunt. The birds have laid eggs in the monsoon season to cash on the abundance of insects. Little loops of food chains, overlapping, giving rise to this entire gamut of survival games. 

The kittens usually spend sometimes a few weeks, sometimes a few months. When they grow up sufficiently they scale the walls to taste the feline freedom of a feral cat who is comfortable with human touch sometimes..