HAWTHORN V. RABBITS 



Yet even the old bushes can be used as fodder for sheep if 

 they are crushed and ground up so as to break the thorns 

 and spines. The Gorse is a very hardy plant, and is said to 

 be only out of flower " when kissing is out of fashion " (see 

 p. 100). 



There is still some uncertainty as to the exact way in 

 which animals set to work when they are eating thorny 

 or spiny bushes. This makes the arrangement of the 

 thorns sometimes a little difficult to follow. Moreover it is 

 often not so much the leaves as the juicy bark in winter and 

 early spring that is required. Sometimes everything above 

 ground is eaten down. 



Rabbits, for instance, do not as a rule touch the Hawthorn, 

 yet Mr. Hamilton says, " The second winter after planting 

 was very severe and this hedge was eaten down to the very 

 ground by rabbits. For about 600 yards I do not think that 

 a single plant was missed."^ In frost and snow almost every 

 plant is attacked by rabbits, and indeed by any grazing 

 animal. 



Remembering that it is very often the young juicy shoots 



that are sought after, it is quite easy to see why the young 



Rose suckers and shoots from the base of the stem fairly 



bristle with long and short prickles. These latter are 



generally straight, not curved like those of the long arching 



branches which are supposed to hook themselves on the 



branches of the surrounding trees. The young light-coloured 



branches of the cultivated GoosebeiTy are flexible, and hang 



over in such a way as to make it difficult for an animal to 



reach the bark : a cow or sheep, if it wished to eat these 



branches, would begin at the hanging tip and make a sort of 



upward tearing jerk while its tongue gathered the branch 



1 Mr. Thomas Hamilton, Researches by Lanarkshire Teachers, 1902-3. 



182 



