Weaving ‘Wassail’ and ‘Finding the Mother Tree’ at the Story Garden

On January 18th, we were honoured to celebrate the tradition of Wassail at the Story Garden with new friends and members of the weekly Gardening Club.  ‘Washeil’, is an Old Norse salutation meaning 'be in good health' or 'be fortunate'. The earliest mention of wassail dates back over 1000 years, to the English Middle Ages (500 to 1400–1500 AD). The ritual was to ensure a good apple harvest and would have occurred on the old Twelfth Night - January 17th. At the heart of the old wassailing tradition is to honour the oldest tree in the orchard so we focused our attention and gratitude on the Story Garden’s Orchard where there are a range of fruit trees and bushes, including several varieties of apple, as well as pear and quince, which all benefit from winter pruning to improve their vigour and fruiting yields in the growing season ahead.

Our attendees began by making a potion of Fire Cider - apple cider vinegar laced with spices, garlic and horseradish and honey. Whilst we chopped, grated and stirred together, we learned about the tradition of honouring trees. From Suzanne Simard’s book ‘Finding the Mother Tree’, we shared how older trees discern which seedlings are their own kin.  In this way, old trees nurture the young ones and provide them with food and water, just as we might do our own children.  These old trees ‘are mothering their children’.  When these older trees die, they pass on their wisdom to their kin, generation after generation, sharing the knowledge of the forest, of what helps and what harms, who is friend and who is foe and how to adapt and to survive to an ever changing landscape! 

With mulled apple and spices wafting in the air, we went outside for another Wassail custom of hanging a piece of bread from an apple tree and celebrated our fortunes to come!  We then went to the kitchen and armed ourselves with pots and pans and wooden spoons and processed around the garden making as much of a racket to get rid or any bad spirits or omens lurking. Unsuspecting passersby looked on enviously, and we imagined that the readers in the nearby British Library weren’t expecting such an interesting diversion from their books that afternoon!

Our group then set to work identifying all the fruiting trees and bushes and learned where and how to carry out winter pruning, before having a go themselves. We left the stone fruit including apricot and cherry untouched though, as they prefer to be pruned during the spring. We finished the afternoon’s festivities with mugs of hot mulled apple and marshmallows toasted around the fire, as darkness drew in around the garden, newly free from evil spirits during the growing season ahead.

To join in the Gardening Club fun, book a place for when the group restarts its weekly get-togethers on Thursday 22nd February 2-4pm

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Notes from the Garden