This article originally appeared in the issue. Witches' broom, cause unknown, on willow. The cause of the witches' broom on the willow sample sent to the Plant Disease Clinic was not identified with certainty. Analyzing the plant tissue for infectious agents such as phytoplasmas requires specialized testing that can be costly. Hebrew/Greek Your Content 1 Kings 19:4 English Standard Version 4 But he himself went a days journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. Pinpointing the cause of a witches' broom can be difficult, especially if the formation is related to an environmental factor. Unlike brooms caused by living organisms, there is usually just one broom per tree when the cause is a genetic mutation. Some brooms appear to be caused by genetic mutations in the buds of the branches. Environmental stresses that injure the growing points of branches can also trigger the formation of brooms. Elijah didn’t have toddlers at home, but in the 18 th chapter of 1 Kings, Elijah took on 450 prophets of the god Baal to prove the one true God was greater than their false one. When Elijah sat down under that solitary broom tree and prepared to die, he had good reason to be exhausted. Organisms such as fungi, phytoplasmas (bacterial-like organisms), mites, aphids, and mistletoe plants can cause abnormal growth when they attack a host tree. It was not a good day for Elijah, either. In others, they are small and well-hidden.Ī number of stresses, both biological and environmental, can lead to the formation of brooms. In some cases, the brooms are quite large in size and are easily spotted. There may be only one broom in a tree, or they may be many scattered throughout the tree. Witches' brooms occur on many different woody plant species, including deciduous trees such as hackberry, maple, and willow, and conifers such as pine and spruce. The term witches' broom comes from the German word Hexenbesen, which means to bewitch (hex) a bundle of twigs (besom). Brooms during this time were made of bundles of twigs. In medieval times, mysterious and unexplainable occurrences were often blamed on witchcraft. A willow branch was recently submitted to the Plant Disease Clinic that had a dense cluster of twigs, a symptom referred to by plant pathologists as a "witches' broom".
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