As the final season of the Earth’s calendar commences, we are treated to spectacular morning displays; the Season of Webs has arrived.
We are reminded that life on this planet is not a pyramid; not a hierarchy; but a wonderful WEB of LIFE celebrating diversity and interdependency. As the totality of the web is made up of individual strands, so too the totality of life is expressed in a multiplicity of unique life forms, each with a right to its unique existence.

In a web, each strand is dependent on every other strand; just see what happens if we pull on one strand. So too each life form is completely dependent on other life forms. So thank you spiders, your genius constructions are a gift to us each morning to teach us the beauty of interdependent existence is all about; a deeper insight into Native American wisdom:

We do not weave the web of life. We are merely a strand in it. (CHIEF SEATTLE)

The eco-system is as delicate and fragile as a spider’s web. To ensure the continuation of a plant species, it will flower at a time when its main pollinators are in abundance and there is maximum output of seeds. There are myriads of examples of how unwittingly humans can upset the delicate eco system; the web of life.

For instance, if a non-native primrose is planted, it may flower earlier or later than the native species, hence tearing a hole in the complex web of life. Tender new leaves unfold on an oak tree in spring just as millions of insect larvae emerge to eat them. Synchronised time-cycles of plants and animals are thrown out of step when we replace native species with non-native.

A web is seldom an independent entity; each is connected to the next by a single delicate strand. The webs are all so beautifully connected together, as it were holding one another up. Earth’s wonderful eco-system – of which we are a part, a strand – is made up of many, many interdependent and interconnected smaller ecosystems.