On 30/11/2012 14:47, echinosum wrote:

David Hill;974054 Wrote:
I always understood that it was variety specific, that is mistletoe from

apple would only grow on apple, where as that from poplars would only
grow on poplars and so on.
The wikipedia article indicates that different subspecies of Viscum
album are fussy about their host tree, but that you will find in UK is
likely all V.album subsp album which appears to be rather catholic about
its host, though it is rarely found on oak and never on conifers; other
subspecies specialise in these but are not found in UK.

This page from Kew has some notes on their attempts to grow it, and it
does not appear to be host specific, they got seed from one collection
to grow on diverse hosts, though with a lot of failures. They seem not
to have tried the birdpoo trick, and did not think nicking the bark was
necessary. They note that light is essential to germination, so the
birdpoo should be around but not covering the seed, and don't do the
covering with moss I suggested.
'Plants & Fungi: Viscum album (mistletoe) - Species profile from Kew'
(http://tinyurl.com/bws8347)
Sounds like I was quite lucky given their success rate.


I also seem to remember being told that the seeds stuck to the birds
beaks and got transferred to the branches when they tried to clean their
beaks.
If the seed had gone through then it would be deposited away from branches.