Next to our home, on the foothill of The Mount
Holyoke Range, is a conservation field, that was home years ago to a Native
tribe. There were several small tribes here, that coexisted peacefully,
canoeing the Connecticut River down that hill , for wild rice, for fish.
Now a dairy farm down the road hays the field, to keep the forest from overcoming the sloping hills of silt rich land. To feed their cows the thick green grasses, dried carefully and saved for cold dark times.
They spray this and all other valley fields, with manure , come spring . You go out, and there's this huge truck lumbering up and down the steep hills and small smooth low points, spraying poop all over.
When the first grass comes up, it's rich with nutrients , and the cow's first milk of May, and it's first butter, will be unlike any other in nutrients. A broad conspiracy to support new life in spring .
After the farmers seem to all agree on when to do the first haying, the wildlife know to follow, for there are wild mice nests all over the land, and exposed .
Sometimes the coyote will return from their new summer dens farther off into the human-inaccessible forest , safer for birthing young , in times when the climate is mild and food plentiful. At times , despite the far off next door neighbor who hunts them with night vision on ATV's and semi-automatics, they will be across the field , their thick red or grey or brown fur glistening in the light.
The wild turkeys will always come to feed, either the young single hens, so independent , or the partnered hens in groups, chowing down, to nourish the eggs they soon will lay, as their toms exhaust themselves , puffing up for anyone and their sister.
The crow neighbors will go happily feed across the field in a delighted heyday, and at times in the dusk you will catch sight momentarily of the smaller mammals that otherwise frequent the compost pile in the night, like the silver backed possum , or the ring tailed raccoon .
Once I think I caught sight of a weasel, who otherwise I only know from their wandering the land and seeing their tracks in deep winter, as they skim across the deep snow in search of chipmunk burrows , in hope of finding those torpid chipmunk who ignored the warnings of their parents, and took their winter's rest too close to the surface of the woods.
All have learned, and taught their young to come and feed and feed well at this time of year, to create strong young ones.
So that when we are out , and the skies are as thick with beauty as any Romantic painter's dream, with violet skies and dramatic crescendo-filled clouds racing by overhead , it seems almost dreamlike, and thrilling.
And in its own way , it helps to offset inequity and injustice and other human endeavor.
Now a dairy farm down the road hays the field, to keep the forest from overcoming the sloping hills of silt rich land. To feed their cows the thick green grasses, dried carefully and saved for cold dark times.
They spray this and all other valley fields, with manure , come spring . You go out, and there's this huge truck lumbering up and down the steep hills and small smooth low points, spraying poop all over.
When the first grass comes up, it's rich with nutrients , and the cow's first milk of May, and it's first butter, will be unlike any other in nutrients. A broad conspiracy to support new life in spring .
After the farmers seem to all agree on when to do the first haying, the wildlife know to follow, for there are wild mice nests all over the land, and exposed .
Sometimes the coyote will return from their new summer dens farther off into the human-inaccessible forest , safer for birthing young , in times when the climate is mild and food plentiful. At times , despite the far off next door neighbor who hunts them with night vision on ATV's and semi-automatics, they will be across the field , their thick red or grey or brown fur glistening in the light.
The wild turkeys will always come to feed, either the young single hens, so independent , or the partnered hens in groups, chowing down, to nourish the eggs they soon will lay, as their toms exhaust themselves , puffing up for anyone and their sister.
The crow neighbors will go happily feed across the field in a delighted heyday, and at times in the dusk you will catch sight momentarily of the smaller mammals that otherwise frequent the compost pile in the night, like the silver backed possum , or the ring tailed raccoon .
Once I think I caught sight of a weasel, who otherwise I only know from their wandering the land and seeing their tracks in deep winter, as they skim across the deep snow in search of chipmunk burrows , in hope of finding those torpid chipmunk who ignored the warnings of their parents, and took their winter's rest too close to the surface of the woods.
All have learned, and taught their young to come and feed and feed well at this time of year, to create strong young ones.
So that when we are out , and the skies are as thick with beauty as any Romantic painter's dream, with violet skies and dramatic crescendo-filled clouds racing by overhead , it seems almost dreamlike, and thrilling.
And in its own way , it helps to offset inequity and injustice and other human endeavor.
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