Why worship mistletoe?

Here's one of our neighborhood live oak trees, looking like a half-and-half special. The green half, of course, is the mistletoe; the sere limbs are the oak. I believe they are doing their early spring leaf drop, to be followed by a new set of leaves. Often I've wondered just why early inhabitants of the British Isles worshipped the mistletoe. Because it remained green through the winter, perhaps -- a sign of life?

Or is it for a more practical reason -- because the knot formed by the roots of the mistletoe could be used as an absolutely splendid cudgel? I knew this specimen was to be found in my yard, but had lost its location until yesterday. It's the best I've seen in a long time.

3 days of spring...

...and over 300 images. Yikes! I'm busy trying to rebuild my inventory so that I can be a slacker every now and then! Suffice it to say I've challenged my walking muscles now that we've had a taste of spring. Too tired to think words, but here are a few of the more interesting sights I've seen along the way.

A bent oak tree, courtesy of the electric utility, which cut off the upright bole to protect its lines.

My favorite large ant nest aboil with residents suddenly warmed out of winter lethargy.

A pothole puddle left from our last storm plus the dead traffic cone that obviously wasn't sufficient warning.

An alleyway dwelling....

Sycamore limbs outlined by a bright sun.

A steel wool rosette in the neighborhood grocery store.

And the wonderfull old, old windmill at the Sharlot Hall museum. Enjoy. I did!

Apples on Oaks???

Have you ever heard of oak apples? There are a couple such galls, above, on one of my turbinella scrub oaks. Far more visible than mere acorns. Made by a wasp.

Similar little wasps made this gall, which looks like a yarn plaything for a cat.

For an easier close-up, I broke off the twig and brought it indoors. Upon consulting The Google, I found that nationwide there are some 800 different kinds of oak galls and maybe 100 types in Arizona. One article noted: They are formed entirely from the mutated cells of the tree itself, but the spark of their creation comes from an insect. A tiny wasp, no larger than the exposed tip of a ball point pen, lays its egg in newly forming tissue on the tree. Compounds secreted by the larva when it hatches induce the tree to form the gall, which then provides both protection and food for the developing larva until it emerges as a fully formed adult.

Except, I discovered, that the bridled titmouse, who hangs out with those small generic bird flocks, relishes gall residents!

I don't know if this gall is the same as or different from the pretty pink fluff. The references note that wasps lay their eggs when leaves are just emerging in spring; this photo was taken in October last year and the pink gall in mid-September, if that is any clue.

Here are a couple of well weathered, long abandoned stem galls; among the goodies The Google delivered was the site for an art print of a stem gall! From my searches, I also learned 1) that oak galls were the basis for black ink in the Middle Ages in Europe and for black dye in pre- Columbian America, 2) that they had/have uses in herbal medicine, and 3) that my Sson had coauthored a scientific paper on oak galls published in 1999. For the record, his doctoral thesis dealt with galls on willows. Small world, isn't it?

Linkety Link! I just got off the Florida Turnpike with k, whose long trip home is finally finished. You might want to get in the right hand seat & ride with her. Quite a lady! But what I didn't know was that the giant kudzu vine that ate the South had reached the Sunshine State.

Acorns Underfoot -- and in Process

As I was walking up the road toward home today, I happened to glance down at a neighbor's driveway. What should I see but many, many acorns.

I peered up the drive and saw still more.

And yet more. No place to grow a new oak tree, however. Nor did I collect a bag of the nuts, which I should have -- these were from the emory oak and are actually palatable without special treatment.

All of which reminded me that I had very recent picures of acorns in development on the turbinella scrub oaks up my hillside, including the half-formed little fellow below.

Now if only I had a close-up picture of an acorn woodpecker to complete the set. Here's how the birds earned that name.

The Lesser Evergreens

The heading is by way of saying that not all mountain evergreens are conifers and their relatives, such as our majestic ponderosas above or the alligator junipers below.

Admittedly, most of our other evergreens are shrubs, sometimes verging on treelike growth. However, the emory oak is a very serious tree, as the the picture above attests. A surprise: the acorns of local emory oaks contain very little tannin and can be eaten without the retting treatment required to make most acorns palatable. My husband and I called them "gourmet acorns" when we first discovered this useful fact.

The leaves of the emory are wavy in outline -- but they do not bite like the turbinella or scrub oak that is so common in the uplands. Take a look at the leaves below. Each of those points is exactly that -- a tiny dagger. And when the leaves from the scrub oak finally rot and turn to mulch, the last item to go is, you guessed it, that little point. Reason enough to always wear gloves when gardening. The turbinella grows to about 15 feet in height and forms thickets. (FYI: the rounded, more yellow-green leaves are mistletoe; the shaggy orangey growth is the result of a gall insect.)

In yesterday's post, you were introduced to one of our more spectacular shrubs, the manzanita. The leathery leaves are green year round, the branches are a striking mahogany red, and the clusters of little pink, bell-like flowers clearly identify this plant as a member of the heather family, along with the arbutus tree. The growth habit of the manzanita is to spread via underground stolens; given an open area for spreading, a manzanita will create a large fairy ring 20 feet or so in diameter as the original portion in the center dies off. And, yes, those "little apples", the fruit, make a fine jam or jelly.

As for the mountain mahogany (above), I've got no idea how it won its name. Probably because the wood is both very tough and heavy. The example below is one of the well watered specimens from the thicket uphill from the house. The limbs seldom grow larger than 2 to 3 inches in diameter, but may range up to 12 or 15 feet tall.

Those limbs or branches are reasonably straight and make a good trellis for morning glories and other climbing plants.

In conclusion, lest we forget, cacti might be considered shrubs -- and they certainly remain green-ish year round. A gentle reminder for friends from Oz -- these prickly pears are growing in their home turf and do not present any ecological problem. My favorite amazing prickly pear fact: the plant is native in all but one or two of the states.

Under the Mistletoe

Along with the Christmas holly, laurel, rosemary, yews, boxwood bushes and, of course, the Christmas tree, mistletoe is an evergreen displayed during the Christmas season and symbolic of the eventual rebirth of vegetation that will occur in spring. But perhaps more than any other of the Christmas evergreens, it is a plant of which we are conscious only during the holidays. One day we're kissing under the mistletoe, and next day we've forgotten all about it

When the Christmas decorations come down, mistletoe fades from our minds for another year, receding into the mists of mythology, rituals and enigma. Particularly in regions where the plant is not native (or is rare), most people do not even realize that mistletoe does not grow on the ground, but rather on trees as a parasitic shrub. So writes David Beaulieu over at About Landscaping.

Of course, in the chaparral and other oak-growing regions of the Arizona hills, most of the mistletoe (and, believe me, there is a lot) isn't really obvious because both it and the oaks are evergreens. In our special spring live oak-leaf-shedding season, only the mistletoe keeps its leaves. Then you get a good picture of just how much of a tree is oak and how much is guest (above and below.)

Mistletoe is a semi-parasite; those evergreen leaves are busy converting atmospheric CO2 into cellular hydrocarbons to make more leaves, flowers and berries. However, the plant depends upon its host for both water and the soil minerals dissolved in the sap.

Christmas aside, in the popular imagination, mistletoe is not just a pest, but a tree killer to be destroyed. My ecologist Sson wonders about how many years mistletoe really cuts off an infested tree's life. As he points out in ecology lingo, "it isn't a good survivial strategy to kill the host." The top pictures are of the parasites in emory oaks with trunks in the 9" to 1' diameter range, which represents many years' growth. The scrub oak in my yard was fully grown 20 years ago when we moved here; I don't see any signs that the plants or their parasites are failing. On the other hand, major drought just might have a big impact, with the two plants fighting for what little water is available.

Note the contrast in color and shape of the oak leaves and the mistletoe. Also very visible in the picture below -- the special knot formed by roots of the guest plant. (It was always my speculation that the reason the Celtic Druids were so hung up on mistletoe was that the oak knot made a fine cudgel. Wrong, of course. The experts cite the rareity of oak mistletoe in Europe, as well as the magic of its evergreen leaves on apple and other barren deciduous trees in mid-winter.) Just FYI, the fuzzy brown ball on the oak branch below is another parasite -- this one, an insect larva. Oaks host many interesting flora and fauna!

The other mistletoe I've seen in the Prescott area is a leafless plant that infests ponderosa pines; a host pine resembles trees covered with mosses in wetter climes. A different variety grows on mesquites, ironwoods and other acacias down at lower desert elevations. One of my favorite birds, the phainopepla, follows the mistletoe, from desert to uplands in season, to enjoy the little white berries as they ripen.

Of course, when the oak (or a branch) dies, the mistletoe is doomed, as the bones above attest.