User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7392
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

Missile Toe

On the way to the beach I notice missile toe in the trees along I-65 south of Birmingham AL, at Montgomery AL there is a place about 8 miles long trees are full of more missile toe than I ever saw each tree loaded with 70 to 100 bunches of missile toe. I did not take pictures when driving south but I did driving back home. Camera batteries were dead by the time I found good batteries we had driven past the 8 mile section of missile toe at Montgomery AL but I got several good pics of missile toe in other trees.

Online information is very interesting, missile toe is often called The Devils Weed. Missile toe is a parasitic plant is sucks juices from other plants and can totally kill an entire forest of trees & bushes. I found missile toe research to be extremely interesting. 4 different type trees were infected with the same missile toe plant, in 10 years missile toe on each tree had evolved into a totally different type missile toe plant. Juice of each type tree are different so minerals from each tree allows missile toe to evolve into a totally different plant. While driving along the highway I saw no missile toe in pine trees, it was only in the other type trees with no leaves. I saw no missile toe in oak trees they hold their leaves all winter then drop leaves in May when trees bud. Missile toe is very toxic and can cause death, it is also used in cancer research.

I had a very hard time taking pictures at 70 mph wife was driving. Not sure if camera did not like taking pictures through a glass window or did not like 70 mph. Camera did better with the window down but camera still did crazy things. I push button to take a pic and nothing happens. I hold button down 10 seconds still nothing happens and tree is long gone then I turn camera away from window camera takes a picture of the dash of the vehicle. Out of 100 pictures I have about 92 pictures of the dash. LOL
Attachments
100_6018.JPG
100_6014.JPG
100_6016.JPG
100_6013.JPG
100_6022.JPG
100_6023.JPG
Last edited by Gary350 on Mon Dec 30, 2019 12:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13947
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Thanks for the pics and the info on mistletoe. It is not cold enough for it to grow here and fake mistletoe is more common than the real ones at Christmas time.

The only story I know about mistletoe was that in Norse legends, it was mistletoe was the little plant that Balder's mother, Frigg, forgot to ask to not harm him. Balder's brother, Hod, was tricked by Loki into killing him with mistletoe.

ACW
Senior Member
Posts: 152
Joined: Mon Sep 13, 2010 7:20 am
Location: London

Over here in the UK ,missletoe is part of Christmas decor,kissing underneathe a bunch is part of the fetive season.
from memory it often grows on apple trees.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7392
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

ACW wrote:Over here in the UK ,missletoe is part of Christmas decor,kissing underneathe a bunch is part of the fetive season.
from memory it often grows on apple trees.
Missile toe use to be part of Christmas season in this country but not anymore. It use to be sold in stores 50 years ago. I have never seen it growing in TN and it was very hard to find growing in IL when I lived there 1/2 century ago..



Return to “What Doesn't Fit Elsewhere”