Debris

Various debris from the recent storm carried home. With this piece of mistletoe having come down from one of the infestations in the Longmead Road. A plant of curious colour and with unusual arrangements for buds and branching.

I wondered how different a mistletoe living with its host was from the budding of a fruit tree, where the top of the tree and the bottom of the tree started out as different individuals. At least the top is a bud from one tree, while the bottom is a root stock of another. Mistletoe has specialised sticky seeds which, with luck, land on a suitable branch and take root, but I have no idea whether it has other specialities.

This small lump was taken from the fallen leylandii first noticed at reference 1. Counting tree rings did not attract many takers, but there was a bit of interest in the sap, perhaps an infantile verison of amber. Very sticky, but removed from hands and fingers with water & washing up liquid easily enough.

The residue on the tray. I was reminded of the business of tapping sap from birch and maple trees, with a mature maple tree producing something of the order of 10 gallons US a season. One might have thought extraction on this scale would stunt growth, but I have not seen anything on that side of things. While birch wine was noticed at reference 2, and I have a memory of investigating the stuff at the heavily stocked booze shop in Old Compton Street, but I don't think that I ever bought any. At least not for personal consumption.

While collecting this piece was a more serious business, involving the wheel barrow and several stops on the way home. The days when I could spend quality time wheeling barrows of wet concrete about are clearly over.

In its permanent home, a complement to Polly's picnic table, for which see reference 3. Pity about the tear in the bark, but all too easily done, so I must not complain. And I dare say it will calm down over the weeks to the point where I only rarely notice it. I dare say it will last for a good many years, being short and stumpy without a lot of weight above to pull it over.

The split chestnut paling behind, a type of fencing I much prefer to the brown fencing panels common in suburbia - and common enough, even in the Surrey countryside where one might have thought that privacy was not a big deal - must be around thirty years old now. Split chestnut holding up well, while the supporting posts are starting to go over, despite treatment with something green.

Starting to fade a bit, but it has provided a bit of interest in the kitchen. Not least by lots of the buds starting to turn into small yellow flowers.

PS: checking the archive reveals that I did indeed go to Old Compton Street, but they could only manage the vodka at £30, rather than the wine, and I passed.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/02/trolley-476.html.

Reference 2: http://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/04/twittering.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/12/series-3-episode-ix.html.