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Cat Island In Japan Tweets For Tuna, Gets Flooded With Food

By Nancy Bailey

From the archive: published Mar 6, 2016, 10 years ago. Details may have changed since.

On the island of Aoshima in Japan, cats outnumber humans six to one. In February, the cats ran out of food.

Aoshima, which has only about 11 square miles of surface area, has no stores. The breeding of cats has gone unchecked. There are about a hundred cats on the island, wandering around the small fishing village and making themselves at home on the few verandas available.

There are about a dozen islands in Japan that have experienced this phenomenon, according to an article in the Atlantic. The cats roam all around the wharf, crouching in driveways, curling up in alleys, trotting down walkways. A clowder of cats greets every group of tourists that clamber off the boats and hit the streets. They bump against legs, getting shooed out of the way. The furry orange or tabby or spotted whiskered creatures are virtually everywhere one looks.

Were it not for the cats, it is doubtful that Aoshima would garner this much attention. Tourists are ferried over to see the cats. There is a designated feeding area where the kitties gather each day, when caretakers bring them food. As the Daily Mail explained, there are no dogs on the island.

In fact, according to Wikipedia, it is prohibited to bring dogs on the island.

The cats were introduced in order to kill mice that were infesting the fishermen’s boats. The silk trade was booming in those days, and many islanders had silk worm farms. Mice were considered a huge danger to the silk worms.

Most of the human population moved off the island after the Second World War, but the cats remained: now over 120 of them. All that remains of the human population is a handful of pensioners that hung around after the approximately 900 others vacated around 1945.

Aoshima is a 30-minute ferry ride off the coast of Ehime prefecture. A daily boatload of tourists come to visit what is locally known as Cat Island.

There are no restaurants. There are no souvenir shops. There are no bistros, no malls, no theatres. There are only the cats. Yet somehow, for the tourists, this seems to be enough.

Makiko Yamasaki, 27, told the Daily Mail the cats alone have made it worth the trip.

“There is a ton of cats here, then there was this sort of cat witch who came out to feed the cats which was quite fun. So I’d want to come again.”

Wikipedia states that in Japanese culture, the cat is considered a good luck charm.

“Cats are said to bring money and good fortune to all who cross their path. Some even claim that it was the cats who kept the majority of the island from being destroyed during the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in 2011.”

When the weather is rough, 9 News said, no day trips can be made. So the few local residents and the cats are left to run out of food. Late last month, one such incident occurred, leaving one of the cat caretakers to tweet a desperate plea for food.

The cat fans came through. After tweeting a postal address, 9 News said, the island’s caretaker was suddenly inundated with supplies. So many offerings came in, in fact, that storing the donations became impossible.

The flood of cat food was so great that the caretakers had to put out a request about a week later, to stop sending food for the cats.

“We got far more than we ever expected, and there’s no more storage room. We’ll be fine until April.”

Cat Island has been inundated with tourists since the story went viral in 2015. RocketNews24 described Cat Island as a “cat lover’s paradise”. A typical weekday sees 20 visitors, while weekends and holidays see over 3o.

Local residents are a bit overwhelmed by all the attention. But, as this year proves, they do see to it that the cats are fed.

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