My four-year-old daughter and I recently watched The Lion King together for the first time (minus the scary bits).

“What’s the circle of life?” she asked. Mufasa explained: “We respect all creatures, from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope” he said. “But don’t we eat the antelope?” Simba asks. “Yes,” Mufasa replies, “but when we die our bodies become the grass, and the antelope eat the grass, so we are all connected.”

This has sparked conversations about food chains, and we talked about the aphids on the elder, which are providing food for the hoverfly larvae we found, which will in turn act as pollinators or provide a snack for a bird.

When I was at school, a traditional food chain stopped there, a linear chain. Mufasa’s circle of life explanation made me think about the link that makes a chain circular – soil, and the decomposers and other organisms that make their home there.

Soil and fungi are essential to our survival, and yet they are definitely not a part of nature that gets much attention compared with prettier wildlife. We have developed a culture that sees soil as dirty, has a fear of bugs, and prefers tidy outdoor spaces that we can control. Don’t get me started on astroturf.

We don’t appreciate the need to protect the rich life below our feet

We live in a pretty sterile environment. We have blasted our soil with so many chemicals so that it too is becoming sterile. We don’t appreciate the need to protect the rich life below our feet that is necessary to complete the circle of life.

If you’re reading this, you are probably already interested in nature and I am likely preaching to the converted. It is our job to pass our interest and knowledge on to others. I consider it one of my most important parenting jobs to show my children what it is to respect and exist alongside nature.

I’m no expert in either the natural world or parenting, so I do this in small ways – I let my daughter get muddy and hold bugs because they’re cool and tickly, not yucky or scary. We go on walks, plant seeds, build habitats, and talk a lot about what we find outdoors. I find I am learning with her, and the boundaries to nature that developed with my adulthood are breaking back down.

“I can tell how much she thrives outdoors”

My daughter often loses interest and I can sense the inner eye-rolls which I will witness more as she gets older. But I can tell how much she thrives outdoors and I hope that her witnessing my own love of nature will leave a lasting impression. Recently, she educated my mother-in-law about the difference between stinging nettles and dead nettles, and I couldn’t have been more proud.

To quote the great Sir David Attenborough: “if children don’t grow up knowing about nature, they won’t understand it. And if they don’t understand it, they won’t protect it. And if they don’t protect it, who will?”

One day it will be my daughter’s world and I will be the grass. It’s the circle of life.