Kissing trees

Nineteen years ago in February, the landscape draped in snow, I found myself fascinated by a pair of beech saplings, their slender forms intertwined like old lovers. Over the passing years, one of the trees has asserted dominance, its girth swelling, while its companion languished in subservience, scarcely growing at all. Yet, despite this apparent power dynamic, the two trees fused together, their vascular layers merging beneath the bark in a natural union. This phenomenon, known as inosculation, finds its roots in Latin, deriving from the word for kiss, ‘osculum’.

This natural phenomenon of grafting occurs frequently when two branches make contact, often charmingly likened to ‘kissing’ or ‘husband and wife’ trees. Although these trees in Cliff Rigg Wood seem to share a close, almost intimate bond.