Скачать или смотреть The Parasitic Apple Tree - A Horticultural Mystery

A tree growing out of another tree. On the surface it doesn't sound too unusual. But this is one variety of crab apple tree growing out of a completely different crab apple tree. Two seperate varieties that should not be mixing or joining together. The parasitic branch bears large normal-sized apples, while the main tree fruit are small berry-sized apples. These are two different trees! Different fruit, different stem or trunk and bark, and different leaves. Weird or what?

But just how unusual is this? Sure, we hear of gardeners splicing or grafting plants together; adding a twig of one plant to the stem of another; but these are generally all the same plant. Having two different plants or trees merging as one is more than a little bit strange.

In nature, the joining of two plants so that one becomes, in effect, parasitic and uses the main plant's nutrients to survive, does happen occasionally. Is it a rare event? I don't know. In all my many years on this planet I have never seen such a thing.

If you are a horticultural expert then please chip in with a comment. Is this a rare event, or something that happens all the time but we just don't notice. For all I know it could be an apple tree from Mars!