Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Totems


Rabbits ate most of my young fruit trees.

Rabbits are abundant in my garden. I usually don't mind. I have more clover in the pathways than grass, and they are content with the clover mostly, all seasons. They eat it all winter, pooping all over the garden, fertilizing it. We have a snow pack for the first time in awhile, it's a thick heavy snow, and they can't get to the clover. Ringed the trees as high as they could reach; they particularly enjoyed the pears, eating through the inner bark and cambium and into the wood, eighteen inches up. They picked at the peach and the new apple. They clipped the short sour cherry from the top down. They chewed up much of the western sand cherry too. It's my fault, of course; they are just being rabbits, and I certainly could have protected the trees without much trouble. Though I'm reminded, I didn't add the rabbits last week, to the list of the things that will keep me from starving :)

There's an interesting story on right now, on MPR (Minnesota Public Radio), about the wolf hunt here in MN. It's sort of like the division in the abortion debate. One side wants no hunt, the other side thinks its a freedom (except the sides are turned, relative to the abortion division). There are an estimated 3300 wolves in Minnesota (or were): 417 were killed in the hunt, another 300 shot and trapped for depredations on pets and livestock, and hit by cars (no one ever asks, what are cattle farms doing in the north woods?) No number given for the illegal kill, but the guy in favor of the hunt, on the radio, did say early on, [parapharasing], "I don't know how many are killed illegally, you can say whatever, 1000, 2000." It's probably more like 300-400 (it does show how "scientific" his "scientific" claim really is, how much he really cares about wolves.)

On the Doomstead Diner, we've been discussing animal totems. I mentioned when I was a young man I identified with the wolf. Which is to say, some people see animals as totems, and some see them merely as a resource, or a menace; other's still would be fine with exterminating all animals (except humans of course). The guy (on the radio) who wants a moratorium on the hunt is talking now, about that totem feeling, native concerns, and I'm pretty sure I just heard the other guy laugh.

I think, when a guy had to kill a wolf with a bow, he might have had cause to "wear" that pelt as an ornament. Instituting a 30-40 percent reduction in population yearly, is a holocaust.

My neighbor just called in. LOL He just said we don't need to count the wolves. He said there's been a big reduction in deer, rabbit and grouse. He said there's a need to "do something" about all the predators in this state (though he gave a full reprieve to bald eagles). He mentioned most of the predators, of course, except human. He's going on and on now, just about to the limit, before they interrupt. He's well spoken (if mistaken - it's not wolves killing all those animals, it's hungry people in hard times.) The lady talking now is saying something about "the lords of nature." My neighbor, the same one that called in, will likely trap and eat the rabbits that ate my fruit trees. He traps about fifty a year, in the neighborhood. He and his wife eat them.

Which, looking at the rabbit as a totem, I see them eating my fruit trees, as a kind of release. A gesture. Permission to let go of this house, this land.

And a warning. Protect the fruit bearing from predation.

 Meanwhile, opportunities abound.

6 comments:

Jason Heppenstall said...

Sorry to hear about your fruit trees. Weird, I was thinking about just that problem today, wondering if deer and rabbits would eat the ones I am planning on planting next week.

Breaking news! We have a 'wolf problem' here in Denmark. Look and see (the headline reads 'Wolves could ruin farmers'):

http://www.bt.dk/danmark/ulveangreb-kan-ruinere-landmaend-0


Apparently just a lone wolf, hungry for a bit of sheep after crossing all those motorways and suburbs on his/her way up from Germany (or perhaps down from Sweden). The righteous are out with their guns and talking about mindless killers and protecting their families. Maybe it makes them feel like real men, or something (dragging themselves away from the Nintendo for just a while).

This in a country that grows 50 million antiobiotic-pumped pigs in concrete pens every year and then chucks away almost half of their food away uneaten. There's something rotten going on, that's for sure.

Luciddreams said...

well, for my part, my totem is the Fox. No doubt about it. If you got a problem with that...try to find me.

All we need to do is seek shelter from man in the wilderness...what's left of it. Nature will provide what we need. It's the Matrix that will starve you to death while they stuff your pile hole full of petroleum sugar fried racoon ass holes on a stick...I've got some fermented hotsauce for sell, you can choke those ass holes down with some fire.

I dig the way you think WHD. I think man's main problem is that he's forgotten what sacredness is. He's forgotten where he comes from. I say, if the zombies are to stupid to wake up and smell the roses than they can just starve to death while they search for some more industrial sponsored CAFO Franken meat to chew on.

I seek refuge in nature...with the Fox as my guide. Come find me

William Hunter Duncan said...

Jason,

I heard on the Huffpost the other day, Switzerland killed it's last wild bear. Won't that be awesome after oil, and Europeans won't have any wild animals to hunt, except maybe wild pigs.

"civilized" people are so full of themselves. The Righteous ones are the worst, and those cross a broad spectrum. I almost cried the other day, some breathless report I heard about mislabeling in seafood. Collapsing fish stocks will be newz after people start dying of famine in the West. Common species will disappear from the shelves and people will continue to purchase the remaining species as if it is of no consequence. To be comfortably acculturated to this madness is to be pathological.

Otherwise, glad to hear from you. lol. :) Yeah, deer and rabbits. They'll eat just about any tender green thing they can reach, esp the ones that humans plant to eat for themseleves. Glad to hear though, there are still deer in England.


Luciddreams,

Will do ;)

Lisa Middag said...

I feel your pain! Happened to all our new blueberry bushes a few years ago and it has set us back quite a bit in terms of fruit production--but they did come back eventually. Protect your babies and good luck!

William Hunter Duncan said...

Lisa,

It's all good. I still have six fruit trees, and the apple they chewed on might survive. BTW - Blueberries!

Thanks for checking in.

Unknown said...

Wolf is the teacher. Rabbit is fear.