I heard that a friend of ours, a Semi-Tropical Forest Regeneration Expert,
said she would not ever cut down a native tree - not even if it was so close
to the house that it threatened the lives of herself and her children.

And she is fine to cut down non-native species.
She is an exceptionally intelligent and pleasant woman -
so I find that interesting.

Here are a few things I see about the situation.
First. She is a 'White' Australian - so even though she does have a bit of
Aboriginal in her, she is not a 'native species.'
The majority of people are not native to the land they are living on - it
has been invaded and the original inhabitants killed off.
Aboriginal people could be said to be more native, but even though they have
been here for around thirty thousand years, the land was here before them.

Second. The non-native species did not ask to come - the White settlers
brought them when they colonized/invaded the country, and, most of the trees
here now are like her - at least a second generation.

Third. It is often assumed by the fanatical environmentalists that we are
intruding and thus 'not part of nature' so do not have equal rights to the
land.

It is true that most humans are greedy and ruthless, and are not sensitive -
either to the land or the original inhabitants.
(Most countries are inhabited by invaders. The original invaders killed off
as many original inhabitants as they could - and still do so in many parts
of the world.)

And, we are at least equal to any other species on the planet, and thus have
our place.

I see every living thing (and what we call non-living actually) as having a
consciousness, and thus should be treated with due respect.

If we build a house in the middle of a field then of course the trees,
animals and insects are going to treat our house as part of their habitat.
So although we have a 'right' to be here as well, we need to be sensitive to
them. Try talking to them and requesting that they do not invade the space
you are occupying.

When we had the place in Italy moles starting digging up the lawn where Tai
Chi was held. We spoke to them and they went away.
(Doesn't seem so effective with Cockroaches though.)

I see that we are all equal.
We tend to assume that, as humans, we are superior - and thus 'above'
nature. It is true that we may be more 'developed' - but in the process have
lost our connection to the natural and thus, without realising it, we feel
lost?

-------------------------

Sabine has written:

Flora and Fauna

We cannot see the live movement of plants as human perception is very
limited. Plus we can only see a certain colour range, and we can only hear a
limited range of sounds. It is likely that there are many phenomena in
nature that we cannot perceive.

And yet we are very certain when we define and classify ourselves, and the
natural world around us. We consider the human race as the superior species,
just because we are capable of abstract thinking, reasoning and
introspection.

These abilities have enabled us to achieve some great things,
but also to argue, fight, pollute, destroy and build sophisticated weapons
capable of the mass destruction of flora and fauna.