Don't Forget The Honey
Record I'm Listening To: Horses - Patti Smith
Beer I'm Enjoying: Highland Brewing's Gaelic Ale
Inspired by Indigenous stories of relationship to land and animal after reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, I was amused, and pleasantly surprised, to find, coincidentally, a local myth about such a thing in a bird book my in-laws gave me recently.
First, you must imagine that you are out in the grasslands of Sub-Saharan Africa, maybe the Kalahari Desert, patiently tracking a kudu, impala, or other species of antelope. As the heat of the day reaches its climax, and thirst and hunger begin to overwhelm your senses, your thoughts are disturbed by the animated flapping and dancing of an unassuming brown bird on the branch of a nearby baobab tree. There are no predators nearby – the grazing herds have made short work of anything that might conceal a stalking lion. Plus, in the heat of the day, they’ll all be seeking refuge in the shade. This is why you’re out at this time of day. Attempting to leave the pestering bird, you’re amazed to see that it not only follows you, but seems to almost be beckoning YOU to follow IT. Could it know where the antelope has gone?
Shifting gears, you decide to indulge this strange, charismatic bird and see where it leads you. Lifting eyes away from the ground and the scrub, no longer looking for the spoor of an antelope, but instead keeping a gaze on the bird as it flutters enthusiastically from one tree to the next. You needn’t worry about not being able to keep up. The bird waits for you.
At last, it seems to stop, but nothing is immediately obvious. The silence of the grassland is broken only by the occasional call of a turtle dove. But above the silent, supremely still air, there is another sound reverberating in the heat. Humming? No. It’s buzzing. The bird has led you to a beehive. Kudu may no longer be on the menu tonight, but instead, you’ve been treated to the sweetest food in all of nature. Honey. Straight from the beehive. But now you have a decision to make. How much to take for yourself and your family? And how much to leave for the bird that showed you the way? There is no correct answer. This is up to you. But remember, every decision we make, leads us inexorably down a certain path…
In Africa, the Greater Honeyguide (Indicator indicator) will actually attract the attention of humans and lead them to beehives so as to have the humans pacify the bees with smoke, and claim the honey. This is one of the only examples of mutualism that appears to have evolved between humans and animals. In African folklore, leaving some honey for the bird results in a greater bounty next time. But, should the humans take all the honey for themselves one too many times, they run the risk of next time being led by the bird, not to honey, but to the highly venomous black mamba, or the lair of a ravenously hungry lion or leopard.