all things connected
In the lazy summer sun the thrushes consume many fruits of the wild cherry and soon begin to become intoxicated; they then turn, flip, tumble and fall allowing me to make close contact with them whilst becoming rather tame. The wild cherry trees are very beautiful at the fall of their vermillion leaves. Their leaves however, contain nectar glands which secrete the same juice as the early white flowers which appear in spring before the leaves. This then attracts many aphids ready to tap into their leaves. Did you know that ants are farmers and spend the summer farming aphids in the canopy of the cherry trees and by stroking the aphids with their antennae encourages them to exude droplets of sweet liquid called honeydew for the ants to gather and devour.
Suddenly a stirring came from all around me and whispers and sighs began to feather through, the trees had come alive. The bees came burring around to complete the scene, and as the low branches were streaked and blurred with sunlight the sight of the bees gathering their sugary sweets was mesmerising. They often came in the month of July when the nectar of the flowers was in short supply. I would gaze at the scene around me in almost reverential awe. I watched until the last red of the sun bled into the clouds above. This wonderful little tree is so loved by insects, birds, mammals and at least one human being, a little tree that carries a very high biodiverse value and one to treasure.
We sometimes feel that we are subjected to endless amounts of conflict and pain but there are equal measures of magical and wonderful happenings all around us, those little puzzles and wonders they present to us, where adventures are to be experienced and secrets discovered, ones that highlight the miraculous ways that the world fits together and works. I believe that we have been the recipients of the choicest bounties on earth. From a personal perspective I feel we may have forgotten God, we have become too self sufficient, too proud to pray. The natural magic of our surroundings is so powerful as to send one out of doors. However, humans have not woven the web of life; we are but one thread within it. We must never forget the gracious hand that created all this wonder. Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves.
All things are bound together, all things connected.
