"A Curious Plant". European Mistletoe, Viscum album, Hortus Haren, Haren, Groningen, The Netherlands
"A curious plant", writes Groningen's professor of botany, Abraham Munting (1626-1683) in his widely circulated manual of plants, his Naauwkeurige Beschryving der Aardgewassen. "It does not grow like other plants on water or in earth; but in the air, on the branches of Oaks, Apple and Pear Trees ... . It has no roots and yet is so securely anchored that it is seldom dislodged by any strong wind." According to him Mistletoe doesn't occur "in our Cold Regions". And so our determined experimenter attemped to grow it from seed in his university garden. He was sorely disappointed. "Many times I have put its seed in either pots or directly in earth as the moon waxed in March, April, May and June, and also when it waned in September, October and November. I planted shallowly as well as deeply, but the plant never appeared." Poor disappointed Munting; little did he know that the viscous seed of Mistletoe, sticking to the branches of its hosts, germinates parasitically there and not in the ground.
Apparently Munting was interested in growing it because he considered Mistletoe to be 'highly medicinal', an All-Heal (one of its names in English).
Mistletoe, in particular that growing on oaks, writes Naturalist Pliny in Classical Antiquity, was known by the Druids to be an aphrodisiac and a strong antidote to poisons. Considered a holy plant, it has been identified as 'The Golden Bough' of myth and legend.
This late-winter photo of a Golden Male Flower (about 6 mm across) of Viscum album was taken in the Hortus Haren, a descendant of the botanical garden - often called "Groningen's Paradise" - established by Munting and his father for the university. A worthy place for such a mystic plant. But here it grows on an Apple Tree and not an Oak. I wonder if that detracts from its efficacy.
"A Curious Plant". European Mistletoe, Viscum album, Hortus Haren, Haren, Groningen, The Netherlands
"A curious plant", writes Groningen's professor of botany, Abraham Munting (1626-1683) in his widely circulated manual of plants, his Naauwkeurige Beschryving der Aardgewassen. "It does not grow like other plants on water or in earth; but in the air, on the branches of Oaks, Apple and Pear Trees ... . It has no roots and yet is so securely anchored that it is seldom dislodged by any strong wind." According to him Mistletoe doesn't occur "in our Cold Regions". And so our determined experimenter attemped to grow it from seed in his university garden. He was sorely disappointed. "Many times I have put its seed in either pots or directly in earth as the moon waxed in March, April, May and June, and also when it waned in September, October and November. I planted shallowly as well as deeply, but the plant never appeared." Poor disappointed Munting; little did he know that the viscous seed of Mistletoe, sticking to the branches of its hosts, germinates parasitically there and not in the ground.
Apparently Munting was interested in growing it because he considered Mistletoe to be 'highly medicinal', an All-Heal (one of its names in English).
Mistletoe, in particular that growing on oaks, writes Naturalist Pliny in Classical Antiquity, was known by the Druids to be an aphrodisiac and a strong antidote to poisons. Considered a holy plant, it has been identified as 'The Golden Bough' of myth and legend.
This late-winter photo of a Golden Male Flower (about 6 mm across) of Viscum album was taken in the Hortus Haren, a descendant of the botanical garden - often called "Groningen's Paradise" - established by Munting and his father for the university. A worthy place for such a mystic plant. But here it grows on an Apple Tree and not an Oak. I wonder if that detracts from its efficacy.