Le Gui

Those green balls up in the trees are mistletoe, or le gui. They are everywhere, great masses of parasitic plants considered pests by people whose business is trees. I could easily make airy remarks about its prevalence in the country where courtly love was invented -- so easily that I'll skip that and go straight to the pictures.



Here is a close-up view:

Le gui is one of the things Panoramix, the Druid, goes off to gather in the Astérix books, so it gave me a little bang of pleasure to find out that those big green balls I'd been looking at ever since the leaves fell in autumn were exactly that. I can picture him trudging down a muddy lane and climbing up with his serpe d'or to cut enough for his latest batch of potion. I know, I know, it's a cartoon. But it's as good as Bugs Bunny, and that's saying something.