THE COMPANION TREE

 
My post today has been years in the making.  I'm sitting on the south side of Tom's Creek next to the "Companion Tree" that's just waiting to share it's story.  It's sunny, in the 60s, and this is the most beautiful Wisconsin spring I can ever remember.  I've never seen so much blue sky and sunshine in  the month of April.  These days call for any idle time to be spent out of doors before the gnats and mosquitoes arrive.

At first glance you wouldn't notice this large white pine was anything but that.  If you look close you'll notice at the base, there's a tall oak tree growing right out of it's side.  These two trees have blended together perfectly, although the oak jutts out to the side reaching for it's own sunlight.  Together they compliment one another, the oak and the pine, such uniquely different species.

I have not seen any other trees growing together of different species like this other than a birch tree growing out of the base of a dead pine stump a time or two.  Wouldn't it be something if one day the oak sported pine needles and the pine sported oak leaves.
 

I'd say this affair has been going on for more than thirty years... and the oak tree is still smiling!

Our spring weather has brought out hepaticas, spring beauties, adder's tongue, and marsh marigolds.  The yellow marigolds, or cow slips as we call them, remind me of my earliest memories of springtime when Aunt Susan came to visit and carried me out to the marsh east of our house to see the cowslips blooming.  No doubt that day long ago was also a happy spring reminder of Susan's own childhood, as she grew up on the same land that I did.

Adder's tongue

Marsh Marigold or Cow Slip

Hepatica

Happy Spring!  It's truly here now, and we've made it thru the winter!