It’s sunflower season here, and the day is as soft and sweet as plum wine. I’ve given up alcohol for September, between the long evenings of summer and Christmas festivities. But the air is full of booze. Underfoot, damsons squish and ferment. Blackberries have turned, and big fat sloes hang like baubles on the blackthorn. Garlands of hop flowers decorate the bushes, and signs for our local beer festival spring up by roadsides.
Among all the hedgerow abundance is an unusual scraggly shape. A messy orb of green and red fronds, about the size of a satsuma. The fuzzy mass feels like moss, and is alive, growing directly from a wild rose, erupting from the stem like a flower.
It is a growth caused by the gall wasp Diplolepis rosae. In spring, the female wasp lays eggs in the unopened buds that release chemicals. The plant responds by creating a protective structure, which inadvertently gives the eggs and then larvae a cosy nest. The larvae emerge when mature in the summer. I know it only by its whimsical name of Robin’s pincushion, but it is also called a bedeguar.
I always imagined the Robin of the name referred to the bird, but it is Robin Goodfellow, or Puck, in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The woodland sprite dances through folklore bringing mischief and mayhem. Maybe turning a flower into a grub‑filled fuzzball is the kind of trick he would play. The galls don’t harm the plant, so the prank is innocent.
The galls have been used for all sorts of weird and wonderful medical purposes – worn around the neck to prevent whooping cough or ground into a powder to treat colic and kidney stones. The colour will redden as the days pass, becoming a fireball of oranges and reds. It also provides shelter for other insects long after the wasp larvae have gone. Nestled within this one are several ladybirds.
As days shorten, and hedge cutters sound in the distance, I drink deep of these moments of warmth and plenty.
• Under the Changing Skies: The Best of the Guardian’s Country Diary, 2018-2024 is published by Guardian Faber; order at guardianbookshop.com and get a 15% discount
