Remembering The Connection - May 24

Connecting with nature is essential—it's where we belong. As part of the natural world, we’re nourished by the simple act of being present with the plants and animals around us. In today’s 5 Minutes In Nature, Liz shares a few intimate encounters with birds and wildlife that gently reminded her of the deep bond she shares with the living world.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott. This is such a glorious spring day. It's a morning that I've come out for a walk and again in recent days I've been walking routes that I haven't walked for a little while and I'm on an old route that I haven't walked probably for about a year I would say. It's a little bit longer than my usual morning walk but what a treat this is walking across moorland down very old tracks that have walls on either side like stone walls on either side that they must be hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years old coming down off the moor through these tracks onto lanes and then onto footpaths that wind through shaded areas that are thick with the growth of new spring plants and my reflection as I'm walking is about connection with with the wildlife. As I was walking I suddenly froze because I saw something in the woods beside me and just a stone throw away there was a deer and she had seen me or had heard me or sensed me at the same time that I saw her so I froze and she froze and her ears were twitching in my direction and she was looking in my direction but I crouched behind a wall so she couldn't quite see me just for what I guess was maybe 20 seconds I felt as though I had stepped through a portal into a different world the world of the deer and I was just aware of her she was aware of me and then suddenly the spell was broken and she must have caught wind of me and she darted away and was gone in an instant and it just reminded me of another moment that I had in my garden recently I've got a tiny little garden and our next door neighbors feed the birds so we actually get a lovely array of different birds in our garden as they queue up on our fence waiting to go on the bird feeder next door and I was just sitting on the bench and overhanging the bench is a rose and something I could see in the corner of my something landed on the rose beside me I didn't dare turn my head for fear of startling it and then suddenly it flitted away and it was now on another rose bush in front of me and I could see it clearly it was a little sparrow little house sparrow and it was eagerly pecking off the aphids on my rose and I was like it was just like it was allowing me into its world and I didn't dare move for the joy it was giving me just seeing it in action in a very natural way eating aphids which is also a lovely thing eating the aphids that were my roses but just just doing its thing in nature and you can probably hear the bird song around me because today is all about interacting with nature interacting with wildlife whatever that might be don't be too judgmental about what you have around you to interact with maybe it's a lazy fly that's flown into your house or a bee or maybe you're just able to really look at a plant or a tree or the bark of a tree or the leaves of a plant or an insect as it makes its way on a journey across the ground it doesn't have to be a deer or a bird up close it could just be something very simple something very simple that you see even on a city street and just give it some attention and time and just see if by giving it that attention and time you slip into a different portal a different space a space that feels as though it's connected and in communication in some way with whatever whatever it is you're alive as in a tree or a plant so today's reflection is all about connecting with nature and giving yourself time to really be present to nature