Every Autumn as I meander after work along my usual route, I pass two specific trees. The first is part way down the hill from our house. The second is further along the main road, a couple of hundred metres past the lighthouse. Both shed “wee hairy balls” in the Autumn and in those balls are slightly flattened chestnuts. (Keep it clean, folks. I can hear you sniggering.)
(credit to the owner Anna Elias via Getty Images – sourced via Google)
I’ll be honest, until a few minutes ago when I did a little Googling, I had no idea what kind of trees they were. Turns out they are sweet chestnuts.
(credits to the owner mikromano via Getty Images – sourced via Google Images)
Last Autumn, having had success the year before at planting acorns which have grown into young oak trees, I decided to gather up a dozen of these chestnuts and plant them in the hope of repeating my success.
(credits to the owner Nenov via Getty Images – sourced via Google Images)
From my experience with the acorns, I know it takes a long time for “trees” to germinate. I planted my twelve sweet chestnuts in late Autumn, nurtured them all Winter ensuring that their pot was sheltered from the storms and in the Spring, I was reward with several wee green shoots.
Success!!
For the past few weeks, I have nurtured the young plants and watched them grow…and grow…and grow.
Suspicion set in…. trees are slow growing, are they not?
What was I actually growing from these “sweet chestnuts”?
Buds started to form…flower buds!
An lo and behold, from twelve sweet chestnuts I have grown a pot of red poppies!
What alchemy is this? LOL
Coral McCallum 