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 […]
berries , Biodiversity , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Gardening , Mistletoe , Other parasites , Science
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Missouri Mistletoe looks European
Here’s a puzzler. Some background first – in the USA the native mistletoes are very different to our European Viscum album and, in multiple ways, inferior in appearance (branching, leaf shape, berry size etc) to ours. The species used at Christmas over there are mostly from the mistletoe genus Phoradendron, which do at least have evergreen leaves and white berries, they’re just not as good-looking! (not to mention not being, actually, the genuine mistletoe of […]
Biodiversity , Blogroll , Current Affairs , insects , Mistletoe , Orchard , Science
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More mistletoe = more biodiversity (especially bunny rabbits)
Can mere mistletoe presence increase biodiversity on the ground below? That seems an odd concept but, actually, studies over several years on mistletoes in warmer countries, and particularly on Australian mistletoes, have shown this to be the case. The impacts are mainly to do with nutrient-enriched leaf litter under the infected host tree, which alter local vegetation on the ground and increase faunal diversity within that litter. It can be so significant that such mistletoes […]
Biodiversity , Blogroll , Mistletoe , Other parasites
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Parasitic plants in spring, Part 1
A parasitic plants update, the first of two (maybe three!) parts. This Part 1 isn’t about mistletoe (see Part 2 for that). Because now is the season for spotting other plant parasites – the ones that parasitise host roots not, as mistletoe does, host branches. It is also, of course, the season for spotting mistletoe seeds germinating – and that’s what Part 2 will be about. For now though it is root parasites – starting […]
berries , Biodiversity , birds , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Mistle Thrush , MistleGO , Mistletoe , Orchard , Science , social history , surveying mistletoe
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MistleGO! A new mistletoe survey launched!
A brand new mistletoe survey has just been launched by the Tree Council and Oxford University, as an app-based citizen science project to assess the state of mistletoe in Britain. Not just where is it, but what quantities exist. This is new, and exciting, as it will help determine what is happening with mistletoe here -it seems to be spreading more and faster, but we need a new study to assess this, and to create […]
Blogroll , Current Affairs , Mistletoe , Orchard
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Return to Pentwyn, to see mistletoe plantings
A visit to the small orchard at Gwent Wildlife Trust’s Pentwyn Farm Nature Reserve, in Gwent, almost but not quite in the Wye valley (and not to be confused with Radnorshire Wildlife Trust’s Pentwyn Farm Nature Reserve in Radnorshire). Way back in February 2011 I led a mistletoe workshop here, during which we planted mistletoe seeds, from ripe berries, on some of the trees – that’s nearly 13 years ago now, so I wanted to […]
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 […]
Blogroll , Mistletoe , Orchard
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Wotta Lotta Mistletoe
Car included to give scale. That really is a lot of mistletoe! Some as big as the car. On poplars in Church Lane, Bentham, between Brockworth and Shurdingon on the A46 in Gloucestershire. It’s a location I’ve been to many times before, but this year those mistletoe growths really do look massive. And unsustainable – at least some will probably break off in winter storms. I was in the area today to look at the […]
berries , birds , Blogroll , Current Affairs , Gardening , Mistletoe , Science , social history
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Wintertime is show time for mistletoe
Mid November: Mistletoe berries are whitening up nicely now – and with every host tree’s leaves now nearly all fallen any mistletoe is becoming very obvious , if you’re lucky enough* to have some! This late autumn phenomenon, of mistletoe suddenly ‘appearing’ within the host (even though it’s been there all year long, obscured by host leaves) is a key part of the magic of mistletoe. It is indeed a very wintery plant, only conspicuous […]
berries , Biodiversity , birds , Current Affairs , Gardening , Mistletoe , Science
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Can mistletoe save the honeyeater?
The Regent Honeyeater, Anthochaera phrygia, an Australian bird, was once so common that its call was heard everywhere. Today, following much habitat loss over several decades, plus recent bushfires, it is endangered, with just a few hundred left. Indeed it is so rare that young males can no longer learn their mating calls, there being insufficient older males for them to learn from. No mating call = no mating. Which makes a bad situation even […]