Brian Griffith's Blog - Posts Tagged "farming"

Though most Chinese villagers do not display obvious reverence for plants or animals, they tend to feel that success on the farm requires that people, plants, and animals get along. In this part of the world, the gradual domestication of crops and animals was mainly a process of forming friendships, as in the rather stunning friendship of rice farmers with water buffaloes. And then there were all the other symbiotic relations that the villagers encouraged, as when they learned that rice, beans, mulberry trees, ducks, and carp fish all help each other to grow. The humans in this landscape were not just takers, using up finite resources. They acted like matchmakers, trying to foster partnerships between creatures.
War and Peace with the Beasts: A History of Our Relationships with Animals