Kahu Pōpoki is a place to live with cats, learn with cats, and talk story with cats.
We share with you the everyday reality of caring for cats in Hawaiʻi. This covers everything from sanctuary life and community colonies to TNR, spay-neuter clinics, research, wildlife, public policy, and the many questions that come with trying to care well for animals and place.
What Does Kahu Mean and What Does Popoki Mean?
Kahu is a Hawaiian word with meanings that reach beyond any single English translation.
Depending on the context, a kahu may be a guardian, caretaker, keeper, attendant, or person entrusted with the care of someone or something important. The common thread is not ownership. It is relationship, responsibility, and trust.
For Kahu Pōpoki, we sometimes use “entrusted guardian” as a short English way to help introduce the idea. But kahu carries more than those two words can contain.
To be a kahu pōpoki is to recognize that caring for a cat creates relationship and kuleana. The cat is not simply something we possess. We are responsible for its care, safety, health, and well-being—and for considering how that care fits within our families, communities, and the places we share.
That way of thinking changes the question from: “What do I own?” to: “What has been entrusted to my care, and how do I care for it well?”
Popoki is the Hawaiian word for Cat.
[Learn More About Kahu Pōpoki]
See what the work looks like in real life.
Meet the cats who share our home sanctuary.
Come along on colony rounds.
Follow cats through TNR.
See what happens inside a high-quality, high-volume spay-neuter clinic.
Watch the everyday moments—funny, difficult, unexpected, and ordinary—that make up life with cats.
These are real cats, real experiences, and real care.
[Explore Life With Cats]
Cats lead us into larger questions about population management, pet retention, wildlife, disease, behavior, veterinary care, conservation, and public policy.
Here we explore what research tells us, what we observe in practice, what remains uncertain, and what approaches may actually work.
Learning is not about collecting information for its own sake.
It is about understanding enough to make better decisions.
[Explore Learn With Cats]
Some subjects cannot be understood through research papers alone.
Talk Story With Cats brings together lived experience, research, community voices, interviews, policy conversations, and video.
We create space to listen, ask questions, share manaʻo, and explore what difficult issues mean here in Hawaiʻi.
Sometimes the goal is agreement.
Sometimes it is simply greater understanding.
[Explore Talk Story With Cats]
One of the foundations of Kahu Pōpoki is the Coexistence Framework.
It recognizes that a pet cat living in a home, a managed community cat in a neighborhood, and a cat near sensitive wildlife habitat need approaches that fit that situation.
The framework helps organize those differences around three zones: PET • COMMUNITY • WILDLIFE
The question is not simply, “What should we do about cats?”
It is: What approach makes sense for these animals, in this place, based on the actual risks and needs?
[Explore the Coexistence Framework]
Good decisions require more than good intentions. When someone says an animal, activity, or community is harming wildlife—or that a particular intervention will solve the problem—we should be able to ask what the evidence actually shows.
CEAS uses eight straightforward conservation-focused questions to examine the evidence behind the conservation claims and proposed actions.
Before we act, CEAS asks:
The questions do not determine the answer in advance. The evidence does.
CEAS also distinguishes between past evidence — what has actually been demonstrated, and future claims—what must be shown before an intervention can be expected to work.
[Explore CEAS & the 8 Questions]
Latest Story
A sanctuary, colony, TNR, or clinic story.
Latest Learning
A new brief, research summary, CEAS analysis, or educational page.
Latest Talk Story
A video, interview, Nā Leo program, or policy discussion.
[See What's New]
“You are invited to come along with us on this very special journey.”
We who live here in Hawaiʻi nei experience and enjoy life a little differently from many other places. The people in our lives matter deeply, and caring for our ʻohana—especially our kūpuna—is simply part of who we are and what we do. Our hope is to share some of what we aloha with you—the cats, the people, the places, the ʻike, and the everyday experiences that make life here special. Maybe along the way, you’ll find something to enjoy, learn from, and carry with you too.
[Life With Cats] [Learn With Cats] [Talk Story With Cats]