Wednesday, 19 November 2008

The Festive Garden

Holly - mystical tree of winter, the red berries protecting the
house since pre-Christian times,  Wards of lightening.
The tree is loaded with berries - a sign of a hard winter,
also a good larder for the birds.


Ivy - the berries were once recommended as a cure for rheumatisim.
The fruit forms by November and ripens  by Christmas.


Mistletoe - sacred plant of the Druids, who cut it with a golden sickle.
Associated with fertility, from which developed the 
custom of kissing under it.
For years I have tried to 'grow' mistletoe on it's traditional tree, the apple.
This is growing in three large clumps on a maple tree, a gift from a passing bird.

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