A recent YouTube video from Kew came to my attention this week. All about our mistletoe, Viscum album, detailing its biology and growth and propagation, plus its biodiversity and some stuff on traditions and legends. All very very (almost suspiciously!) similar (even the title) to the words and phrasing I’ve used in talks and articles over the years. But generally a great video (did I mention it was familiar?). Even covering Viscum minimum on fleshy […]
auctions , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Media , Mistletoe , music , social history , Tenbury Wells
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Mistletoe Songs #1
Following the recent media nonsense speculating that mistletoe traditions are on the wane, I thought about documenting various evidence to the contrary – not least the constant presence of mistletoe in book titles (lots of mistletoe-themed murder mysteries (!) and romances, in equal measure) , TV and film titles/themes (romance again, and, bizarrely, murder mysteries again) and in seasonal songs (romance only, I’ve not spotted any mistletoe murder songs yet). The whole gamut of that […]
berries , birds , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Media , Mistletoe , surveying mistletoe
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Mistletoe morsels 2024
A slow start to Mistletoe Diary his year, too many other things going on. But masses of miscellaneous mistletoe morsels are planned for the next couple of weeks including: – Mistletoe in Parliament – a round-up of mistletoe mentions in the house, whether serious, jokey or filibuster – Mistletoe Song of the Day – a selection from the 1830s to the 2020s. Some good, some bad, some non-PC – Mistletoe as a habitat for an […]
auctions , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Media , Mistletoe , social history
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Mistletoe Matters – Bluesky thinking
Just a quickie to say that I’m still blogging here (obviously) but am no longer using X/Twitter. So you can follow the blog here, or via facebook or via the new account (to replace X) at Bluesky.
auctions , Biodiversity , Blogroll , Current Affairs , druids , Gardening , Media , Science , social history
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Mistletoe Season 2024/25
A belated start to the diary this year! A few snippets of info and dates for now, more soon: Dates This year’s Tenbury Mistletoe Festival (and National Mistletoe Day) will be on Saturday 7th December. Details still to be confirmed, for updates see https://www.tenburymistletoe.org/ One definite fixture is the druid mistletoe ceremony at 3.00pm on the Burgage. This year’s Tenbury Mistletoe Auctions will be on Tuesday 26th November and Tuesday 3rd December at Burford House Garden Centre, Burford, Tenbury […]
Blogroll , Current Affairs , Media , Mistletoe , Religion , social history
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Mistletoe nonsense 2023 #2: Sister Boniface just about gets away with it.
Following my last entry, about the wildly inaccurate account of mistletoe in Ideal Homes magazine this month, I now offer some light relief, as my second example of recent mistletoe inaccuracy is more humorous, and much less annoying!. It is the 2023 Christmas Special of TV’s Sister Boniface Mysteries broadcast a few days ago (and viewable on demand on UK TV Play in the UK). The plot, a light-hearted and undemanding whodunnit based, very very […]
auctions , berries , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Gardening , Media , Mistletoe , Mistletoe Day , Science , social history , Tenbury Wells
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Mistletoe time, again – news and updates for 2023/24
A slightly late start to the blog this year – but announcing all the usual stuff; the berries are looking good, whitening up already, mistletoe events are being organised, mistletoe studies are being planned and mistletoe commerce is underway. In events news there are the usual mistletoe auctions at Tenbury Wells – this year on Tuesday 21st and Tuesday 28th November. Details for buyers and sellers are at https://nickchampion.co.uk/auctions/holly-and-mistletoe/ or, if you just want to watch, […]
berries , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Gardening , Media , Mistletoe , Science
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Mistletoe germination
End of March – the end of the mistletoe season for us, but the middle of the germination season for mistletoe seeds. Why the end for us? Well we spend much of February and March each year working with mistletoe, especially in neglected sites, and supplying mistletoe seeds and advice to those who want them. The arrival of April is often a welcome break as mistletoe has dominated our lives since October! But for mistletoe […]
berries , Biodiversity , Food and Drink , Media , Mistletoe , Orchard
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Mistletoe Management on BBC Countryfile
We got a good 6 minutes on mistletoe management in neglected orchards on BBC Countryfile’s Christmas programme this year. The location at Moreton Valence, very close to me in Gloucestershire, was a rather neglected apple orchard which has far too much mistletoe in it, the normal balance from regular management having been lost some years, possibly decades, ago. Countryfile’s Adam Henson, a Gloucestershire farmer himself, joined me and my Gloucestershire Orchard Trust colleague Tim Andrews […]
Biodiversity , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Media , Mistletoe , Science , social history , toxicity
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The Journal of Ecology has a new, and long-planned, mistletoe paper
There’s a new, multi-authored, mistletoe paper just published in Journal of Ecology, which has been years in the making! It’s part of the British Ecological Society’s long-running series ‘Biological Flora of the British Isles‘, in which every paper covers the biology and autecology of just one species. In this case mistletoe, Viscum album. You can read the promotional blog (How green is kissing under the mistletoe?) about it on the Journal website here, but don’t […]