The other morning I was walking down a spring path, following the trail of bunny feet. Turning a corner, I spied a pink tail disappearing into the brush, and I thought I saw something fall out of its basket.
It is called an oak gall, or "oak apple" When I was a kid, someone told me that they were eggs that hatched little trees, and I believed them. They are actually sort of a cocoon for wasps. Below is the actual explanation.
"The galls are actually malformations of plant growth. The tiny gall-forming wasp lays an egg in an oak leaf at a precise moment in the tree’s growth cycle, causing normal plant cells to multiply at an unusually high rate. As a result, the tiny egg becomes encased in the gall composed of oak leaf tissue.
When the egg hatches, the gall provides both food and a living chamber for the larvae. In summer, the oak gall drops to the ground with the tiny wasp larvae inside. The insect moves in jerks, causing the entire gall to jump around on the ground. It’s believed that the larvae hop around in an attempt to find a crack in the soil to hide up in. At maturity it transforms into a pupae, and later into an adult which chews its way out of the gall. The wasps themselves are dark colored, so tiny that you’ll probably never see them, and harmless to people."
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Date: 2003-04-22 10:41 am (UTC)Yikes....
since you asked....
Date: 2003-04-22 12:27 pm (UTC)It is called an oak gall, or "oak apple" When I was a kid, someone told me that they were eggs that hatched little trees, and I believed them. They are actually sort of a cocoon for wasps. Below is the actual explanation.
"The galls are actually malformations of plant growth. The tiny gall-forming wasp lays an egg in an oak leaf at a precise moment in the tree’s growth cycle, causing normal plant cells to multiply at an unusually high rate. As a result, the tiny egg becomes encased in the gall composed of oak leaf tissue.
When the egg hatches, the gall provides both food and a living chamber for the larvae. In summer, the oak gall drops to the ground with the tiny wasp larvae inside. The insect moves in jerks, causing the entire gall to jump around on the ground. It’s believed that the larvae hop around in an attempt to find a crack in the soil to hide up in. At maturity it transforms into a pupae, and later into an adult which chews its way out of the gall. The wasps themselves are dark colored, so tiny that you’ll probably never see them, and harmless to people."
no subject
Date: 2003-04-22 10:51 am (UTC)Man, I haven't seen or thought about an oak gall since about 1986.
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Date: 2003-04-22 11:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-22 12:30 pm (UTC)