Spindle treelike fairy lights aglow

THE spindle is one of my favourite native trees, though I admit that when it grows in the wild it’s often more of a shrub than a tree.

It’s principal glory is those extraordinary four-chambered orange/pink fruits in autumn when, on a sunny day, the tree looks as if it has been decorated with fairy lights. Historically, though, its hard, white timber was also highly prized.

The fruits, by the way, are poisonous to humans and livestock, though not to birds, which love them and are the principal means of seed distribution for the species.