Nature's Place

Mason’s of Old

It’s ‘not’ just one more example of our own true nature, where we come from and how we do what we do. These wasps are known as potters or masons, for their working of mud to make their nests. One of our oldest building materials to provide for our oldest need, shelter or protection from the ‘elements’.

These creatures handle this material with a mastery, in their way. They will find a source of water with nearby suitable earth for mixing to a malleable consistency for their structural needs. Little mud huts or domes, or nests where they lay their eggs to give their young the best chance of survival they can.

They are a wonder to watch and it’s wise not to get in their flight path. Like most creatures they have their habits and anything that interrupts the pattern is subject to scrutiny. Habit has the advantage of when it is broken the attention or intelligence is alarmed to the fact, something’s out of line. Some habit is a good thing.

And when the mud has done its job and the young wasp breaks out it breaks down again to become once more just a part of it all that is available to the whole for whatever need. It’s another of the sustainable practices of nature that we have distorted in our search for security and permanence. But everything ends, even our steel and concrete ways.

Mason wasps never get stuck in the mud, inside or out. They never hold on to any notion of security, based on some fear for the future borne in the past. And some don’t emerge from the mud nest.

Stuck is not an option. Dead is ok. Free is better.

*

Old walls crumble, new horizons appear.

© Mark Berkery ……. Click any picture and click again to enlarge

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6 Responses

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  1. Mark said, on 25/06/2010 at 2:50 pm

    Thanks all.

  2. bartlebee420 said, on 23/06/2010 at 11:39 am

    these are beautiful, great job!

  3. Rajeev said, on 23/06/2010 at 7:13 am

    Wasps are amazing, but commentary even more.

  4. Bu Yousef said, on 23/06/2010 at 2:24 am

    I love your photography… You’re on my google reader :)

  5. Nature Girl, April said, on 21/06/2010 at 10:31 am

    Your photos are magnificent, Mark. I especially love the wasp photos. And you’re right: FREE IS BETTER! :-D


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