“The Feuersteinchen and the Hidden World of the Wild Meadow”
Behind the monastery ruins in Eldena, there is a meadow that looks completely ordinary from a distance. A bit of grass. A few trees. Plain green.
But that isn’t true.
Because right in the middle of this meadow lives an entire community of beetles, snails, wild bees, and other small creatures that most people never notice.
Except, perhaps, the Feuersteinchen from the Naturkindergarten Greifswald.
That morning, they had come on a wild safari together with our bee expert Christoph Kornmilch. And after just a few steps, things suddenly became strangely quiet. Not the meadow. The children.
Because everywhere, there was something.
A beetle sat on a finger, shimmering green like a tiny gemstone. A snail glided calmly through the damp grass. Between white blossoms, a bumblebee buzzed deep inside a flower, with only its fuzzy little bottom still visible.
“There!”
“Wait a second!”
“Don’t fly away!”
“Look over here!”
The Feuersteinchen did not walk across the meadow the way adults do. Adults are usually trying to get somewhere. The Feuersteinchen, on the other hand, kept stopping every few steps. Because there was always something that needed to be discovered.
Some knelt right down in the grass. Others carefully held out their hands so a ladybug could crawl across them.
And then, suddenly, a stork was standing in the meadow.
Just like that.
Tall. White. Calm.
Everyone looked.
The stork looked back.
Then it slowly walked on, as if it had things to do itself.
Later, the Feuersteinchen came to a large hill of sand. Fresh sand, piled up between the grass and the trees. It still looked empty. But Christoph Kornmilch explained that wild bees might soon make their homes here. Not somewhere far away, but right here.
The children looked at the hill for quite a while.
Maybe because sometimes you can already tell that a place is becoming important, even before anyone has moved in.
When the wild safari was over, the meadow looked exactly the same as before.
But maybe not quite.
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