Moss Chicken Mother

She cannot possibly know this, and might not care even if she could, but at this very moment, there are one hundred and fifty-seven people watching her from around the globe.

The humans—the rangers who keep her safe—gave her a name years ago. She does not know this either and, again, might not care if she did. She sees humans only on occasion and often flees when she does. Whenua Hou is a small island, and as a nocturnal, ground-dwelling bird, the only parrot in the world with wings that seem better for decoration and kerfuffling than flight, she has learned not everything she encounters is as friendly as it seems.

One of her most loyal viewers knows this all too well. Still recovering from a broken heart, the girl watches the parrot’s livestream religiously. She can’t remember, now, how she first learned of the kākāpō, affectionately known as the moss chicken, but if not for this new bird on which she has hyperfixated, she might have lost her mind before the chicks even hatched.

When the girl was young, she thought cheating happened only in school. The first time she witnessed a cheating storyline in a soap opera, she assumed the busty woman’s greasy husband had peeked at someone else’s test.

That’s wrong, she told her grandmother, reclining on the couch.

It sure is, her grandmother replied, nodding solemnly.

Later, after managing to get a boy to ask her out, the girl spent all her free time worrying he would cheat.

just checking in on you, she would write. what are you doing now?

At first, she hoped he would respond with something like thinking of you. Then, when it became clear that he did not think of her, or of much else, she decided any response would do.

As long as he could prove he was really where he said, she wouldn’t ask any further questions.

Until, of course, she did, at which point he promptly broke things off.

While that boyfriend never cheated, at least as far as she knows, this latest one, her fiancé, most definitely did.

For days after the breakup, every time she closed her eyes, she was once again haunted by the look on her ex’s face.

He had been so shocked when she confronted him. He hadn’t expected her to catch on.

There was fear. Sadness. Then pity.

Then he started getting mad.

He looked like a stranger, she kept thinking, as he shouted in her face. He was nothing like the dough-faced boy she had met so long ago. He accused her of a laundry list of things, all of which boiled down to this: She was not good enough. For him or for anyone.

It’s no wonder, then, that she finds comfort in the kākāpō. Ten minutes into the livestream, as the mother fed her chicks, the girl picked up her phone and called her mom for the first time since the breakup.

Despite what the girl now fears, most humans are ultimately kind. If not all of them, then at least the ones who know about the kākāpō. The rangers who check on her and her chicks to ensure they stay alive. The people who symbolically adopted her and pore over every conservation newsletter. Many of these supporters now tune into her all-hours livestream, the camera hidden in her nest.

This nest of hers is underground, beneath the roots of a rātā tree. She has nested here for several breeding seasons, each of which occurs only in years in which the rimu tree produces fruit. As a result, in her twenty-four years of life, she has experienced only six breeding seasons.

This year, she is fostering a couple of chicks. Neither is her own. The rangers switched the eggs around, knowing this bird is a good enough mother to raise the most genetically vital chicks. In this way, she reminds one viewer of his childhood best friend’s mother. After hearing he had gotten into yet another fight with his dad, she insisted he stay in the guest room until graduation.

No one ever sleeps there now, his best friend’s mother said, all but shoving him into the room. It’s such a waste to leave it empty. Just stay. You’d be doing us a favor.

Every day, she fluffed the pillows and fixed the patterned sheets. He tried to make the bed himself, but she did it so much better.

When it came time for him to leave—the house first, then the state—he felt as though he had been pushed out of a tree, his arms as useless as the wings of a kākāpō. He could flap, could flounder, could scrabble for purchase, but in the end, all he could do was fall.

He’s adjusted over the past couple of months. He’s had no choice, really. Moving away was supposed to be his dream.

Yet he still wakes up expecting to find himself back in the guest room. He wonders if the real dream is what he left behind.

There are two things the man has yet to learn: The first is that the wings of a kākāpō are not useless. They are used for balance while the flightless bird climbs. They can also become the parrot’s parachute, allowing it to leap from high places and coast before landing safely on the ground.

The second: Just because he left doesn’t mean he can’t go home.

Unlike his childhood friend’s mother, who is, as far as he knows, still as in love with her husband today as she was when they first married, there is no partner to assist the moss chicken. Following successful mating, the male kākāpō makes no further contributions.

Typical, one viewer typed upon learning this “fun” fact. The father of her twelve-year-old son had done the same: made the kid, then went on his way. Her son was the one to get her hooked on the livestream.

For the first few days, she attempted to convince him to let her watch her favorite singing competition on the TV. At some point, she realized she preferred watching the bird with him. She now tunes in even when her son is out. She watches it on her phone, not on the TV, as he does. She can’t see much, but the rustling sounds gently lull her to sleep.

It took about a month for the kākāpō eggs to hatch. The chicks will stay in the nest for the next three months. For another three months after that, the chicks will stay close to their foster mother, still depending on her for food and protection.

In this way, they are not unlike another one of the livestream viewers. Though she is months from turning thirty, older than the flightless parrot she watches daily, she still lives at home. She often worries she will never leave again.

She tried once. It did not work out. She had no choice but to come home.

She and all the others watch the bird as if their lives depend on it. In a way, perhaps they do. They need something good to keep them going. Need proof that life goes on.

Some argue that, if the moss chickens cannot survive alone, it’s the world’s way of telling them they do not belong. These people seem to forget, or else do not know, the kākāpō once lived all across New Zealand. It was only after humans introduced predators that the moss chickens’ sad and silent struggle first began.

Are humans intrinsically good or bad? Do they only live to cheat? Are they programmed to always leave or fail or break each other’s hearts? The viewers of the livestream do not have answers to these questions and may not ever find them by staring at a black-and-white video feed of a moss chicken on an island far away.

Isn’t it possible, though, that they could? They’re watching the rangers sneak into the nest every time the mother leaves. They’re excitedly typing in the livestream chat as the rangers provide their daily updates. They’re telling each other maybe once the streams are over, they can move to a different platform so they can stay in touch. In doing all of that, aren’t they demonstrating that it’s possible to keep going, even after devastation?

They may not know much about their fellow viewers, may not have asked for the others’ names, but they can still learn. One day, after digging deep enough and growing tired of hiding away, they will lift their heads and flap their wings and climb back up into the light. They will bask in the sun, these beautiful freaks of nature, and together, they will thrive.