The donkeys and sheep calmly walk slightly behind me or at my side as they follow me into the pasture. I stop when we are there and they fan out on either side of me, finding their own way to the best grasses and flowers to eat.
Jon asked about bush hogging the pastures, but I told him we have to wait, that the flowers have just bloomed. The bees and butterflies, moths, and flies need them. And we need the insects now more than ever.
Fate winds her way through the thick wildflowers using the footpaths that the deer have made. She disappears in the Bee Balm, Queen Anne’s Lace, and Joe Pye weed. Then she reappears in the oregano, bedstraw, birds-foot-trefoil and knapweed, the lower-growing flowers.
When the animals walk with me so calmly to the pasture, I feel the trust between us, the ease in knowing each other and what is expected. What we have all come to depend on.
You and your animals have a beautiful ritual based on trust! It’s like a pair of dancers that never have to watch their feet, they are able to look at each other’s eyes and trust that their feet will follow where they need to go! Animals and nature have so much to offer, all we have to do is be present to receive their gifts!
What a wonderful analogy Josie. And that’s just how it is. Thanks for your insight!
Oh Maria, I wish more people appreciated our pollinators and native flora and the need to let them bloom, provide food and set seed.
Our property borders NY state land. Distressing to see them mowing scrubby areas that provide insect and bird habitat and food sources and creating grassy monocultures. In what should be protected areas.
What the heck!?
I don’t understand that either Lois, I’d have thought we were further along in our thinking at a state level. I guess that’s kind of naive of me though, now that I said it.