Feeding Time

Nature is a forever enthralling spectacle. It can be red in tooth and claw but, simultaneously, intriguing and beguiling in equal measure. I have grumbled on occasions about the deer eating the roses, the slugs destroying the dahlias and the badgers decimating the lawn in the search for worms. But throughout, I have advocated the notion that we share our garden with the wildlife.  A sanguine outlook is what I might espouse but the price might be a bit more chicken wire than I would really like.

This week I noticed a fascinating juxtaposition of the wildlife eating the plants and the plants eating the wildlife. Below is the sarracenia that lives in the conservatory. Sometimes known as the pitcher plant, it happily lives in a disused wall fountain ornament. This is ideal as it still holds water to give the plant the boggy conditions it requires. But on closer inspection it was clear that this carnivorous plant was in the midst of feeding time.

By contrast the blackbird decided that a tasty, ripe strawberry was much more to his liking. I will not grumble as we have already had a much better harvest this year than ever before. 

So, to use a phrase first coined by Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe "lets share and share alike!"