Mistletoe

Well the mistletoe is a favourite plant at Yule time, as everyone knows the story about the special kisses happening under the display of mistletoe. But most people are not fully aware that mistletoe is poisonous, but it's also a parasitic plant that grows on different types of trees, such as hawthorn, apple trees, limes, poplar, maple, and conifers. What mistletoe does is drain their host trees of nutrients and moisture, weakening them. Birds like Mistle thrush and Blackcaps eat the berries of mistletoe, then afterwards they throw away the seeds. This would help other birds make nests. Mistletoe is also called viscum album, which means "white goo"! 

Kissing under the mistletoe is a very old tradition, and many believed it represented fertility. Mistletoe berries look like pearls, and also could be mistaken for snow flakes. Many women in Italy kept mistletoe as they believed it protected them from evil and would also help them become fertile. The ancient druids thought that the white berries of mistletoe was the semen droplets of the Oak King. Pliny the Elder made note in his Natural History book, that the druids foraged mistletoe "on the sixth day of the moon" using golden sickles and white cloaks so the plants would not fall to the ground and lose their magical powers. White bulls would be sacrificed during the ceremony called Ritual of Oak and Mistletoe. This would result in the mistletoe berries used to enhance fertility in livestock.

In Norse mythology, mistletoe was the only plant that could kill the god Baldur the Beautiful. The trickster god Loki discovered this very plant was the weapon so he persuaded the blind god Hother to shoot it at Baldur, killing him instantly. The gods cried for the death of Baldur, and goddess Frigga wanted his life restored. She cried so much that her tears changed the colour of mistletoe berries from red to white, then Baldur was returned. So it was decided that the mistletoe would symbolise love and resurrection from the dead.    

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