The Predator in Your Pasture

No, I am not talking about lions, tigers, or bears. I am talking about the other ones, and you know the ones I mean; the four-legged, leaf-ripping, tiller-tearing, stem munching, crown stomping, and mobile manure spreading mammals known as herbivores. Now I recognize that most people don’t view their little “Happy” the horse, “Lily” the lamb, or “Harriet” the Holstein in the same light as they do lions, tigers, or bears (and of course, the occasional “Oh My”) but that is because you are not a green plant.   If you were, your entire worldview concerning the likes of “Happy,” “Lily,” and “Harriet” would change with the first ripping tearing bite, the first sap crushing stomp, or the first light-robbing plop of poop that renders your solar collecting chloroplasts utterly useless. Nor are you an herbivore that despite having foraged all day has not been able to break through a plant’s physical defense mechanisms to acquire enough nutrients to meet your base energy requirements let alone recover the additional energy costs for having spent an entire day on the move. Or worse yet, you are an herbivore that took a few bites of a plant that, the last time you ate it, was high in nutrients and low in toxins but now is high in toxins and low in nutrients, and now you are not feeling much like eating despite the fact that you have not yet met your intake requirements. Obviously this is good for the plant, but not so good for you. The Battle Going