MISTLETOE. 303 



Some berries produce two, and a few three, of these shoots, 

 which is rather singular, as nature provides very few seeds 

 with more than one growing germ. 



Little more progress is visible till the winter is past and 

 spring sends the sap along the branches to form its yearly 

 layer of new wood or annual ring. 



The sinker now produces rootlets, which grow at right 

 angles to itself, running up and down the branch in the inner 

 (or bast) layer of the bark. 



These cortical rootlets in their turn produce sinkers similar 

 to the parent one. 



The sinkers do not pierce the wood, but the young wood, 

 when forming, surrounds the fixed point of the sinker, and 

 gradually year by year grows round it and banks it up with 

 wood, thus making it appear in a year or two as if the sinker 

 had penetrated the hard wood. 



While the roots are developing the plant has been growing 

 very slowly, and about the second year will have only pro- 

 duced two small leaves. After that it gets on much quicker, 

 and when the branch of the tree begins to swell it may be con- 

 sidered established. 



When an old mistletoe dies, the sinkers survive for a time, 

 but ultimately moulder and fall to pieces, leaving the wood in 

 which they were embedded exposed and full of holes, looking 

 like holes in a wooden target. 



The cortical roots, however, generally survive, and grow 

 through the bark into new plants. 



Thus a tree, once infected with this parasite can seldom get 

 rid of it, as, in a few years after the old plant has gone, 

 probably two or three young ones will be found to have taken 

 its place. 



The male and female flowers grow on separate plants, so 

 unless there 4s a male and female plant flowering within pollen- 

 carrying distance of each other there will be no berries produced. 



There are a good many different kinds of trees on which the 

 mistletoe can be grown, and it is strange that, although it 

 likes the apple, a sour one best, it will rarely grow upon the 

 pear. 



The thorn, rowan, willow, poplar, lime, fir, and Siberian crab 



