Leave the remains to those who claimed it first

      In our backyard, we meticulously manage a variety of fruit plants nursing them into fruition. Many of them escape our attention and reach on time when they are all set to make us happy. Though late at times, we do go for harvest at reasonable intervals and enjoy ourselves. The extra harvest would usually go for distribution in the neighborhood and to friends and families.

One very heartening sight is to see the much-awaited fruit already claimed by its natural stakeholders. Squirrels, bats, parrots, bulbuls, crows and so goes the long list of mainly arboreal but rodents like rats too join the gang.  We don’t care much if the plant is grown on its own from the seeds sown by the same gangsters. Of course, there are some very good ones of that sort around. The ones we do a to z to grow and look forward to fruiting but end up seeing a good portion already shared up is very frustrating. We the young generation make haste to destroy the remaining portion in vengeance for looting our bounties. I don’t know how far we can rightfully use “our” the possessive adjective before fruit in this sentence.

 “Leave the remains to those who claimed it first”. My mom’s quick intervention as our team leader would soon leave us with no other option.  This is her way of looking at it. The fruits they started feasting on will therefore remain right there until they are fully used up by each member on and off taking their turns. At their mercy lies whatever ones are yet-to ripe for our table and taste buds. And to our misery, we don’t judge how good a plant is, as Matshona Dhliwayo suggested, by examining how many birds flock to feed off its fruit.