This is a perfect example as to why RS urged us to let our children develop their creative rather than their intellectual abilities at an early age. We are missing something in our present existence and when one is missing something one doesn't know it because it is missing.
As long as we try and break down things into their intellectual components, we will never fully understand them. To get a clear understanding of the "animal influence" we cannot just break it down into an animal and plant duality. When we look at a well-developed, natural system, it always contains many levels, not just two. There are many different animals that contribute to the well being of a system. We cannot compare an earthworm's contribution to that of a grazing animal, just as we cannot compare a chicken's contribution to a farmers. If we use manures, we are not taking the earthworms out of the equation. If we did, the system would not be as efficient. I felt a tremendous amount of joy the other day as I was admiring a beautifully lush cover crop of rye, vetch and field peas. As I looked at the rye and field peas pushing up through the thick cover of vetch. I all of a sudden felt how incredibly different the peas and the vetch were. Maybe this vast difference can be explained intellectually and maybe it can't, but I could feel it, and in feeling it, I knew that it was precisely this difference that made the world an incredibly strange and wonderful place that is filled with mystery, joy, love and life. It is diversity on a farm that is the key to health and the farmers ability to let that diversity breath in and out the rhythms of the cosmos and speak to us of what it needs, rather than just relying on chemistry or our intellect. We desperately need to develop this side of us and in so doing loosen up some on our desire for dominance/control. It can't necessarily all be explained but that is to me the beauty of biodynamics. If there is one observation that I have made that I feel is a valuable one, it is that a system that lacks the proper diversity, always declines. I feel if these ideals are followed and one doesn't want livestock, then one will find the proper way. In Love and Light, Chris