There's a noble fir growing out of my lodgepole pine!

"Mike says that there is a noble fir branch growing out of his lodgepole pine," my dad said.

That was obviously impossible.  It did sound like some kind of mutation that I should check out, however.  I told Dad that I'd be very interested in checking it out.

The following day, he told me that Mike would be leaving his place at 8, so we needed to be there at 7:30 in the morning to meet him.  My dad is a morning person extraordinaire, so he got me up at some ungodly hour- I don't remember exactly when.  We ended up leaving very early and showing up at Mike's place at about 7:00.  It wasn't even light out.  

We walked out into the lodgepole woods away from Mike's place a hundred yards or so, accompanied by the sound of the barking huskies back at the house.  There was maybe a foot of snow on the ground, and it was in the mid-20s.  Such temperatures are typical in northeastern Washington in December.  

Mike found the tree and showed us his "noble fir" branch.  It was a flat broom, dangling from a spindly and weighted-down branch near the bottom of the tree.  Such a broom is a welcome change from the usual fall-to-your-death locations of most brooms.  I wouldn't need climbing equipment or a shotgun to get pieces of this one.

The needles of the broom were less than half the length of normal lodgepole needles.  Most of the foliage in the center of the broom was dead- presumably from being shaded out.  Most branches this low in the canopy die, so the tree can put more energy into branches above that have access to more light.  In a few more years, this broom may die completely.

I did not have many rootstocks left of this species this year.  The ones I had were slightly too small (the diameter of the scion should never be larger than the diameter of the stem of your rootstock.)  I took a few scions anyway, just to give it a try.  I could always go back next year and get more if it didn't work.

As I write this, most of the grafts don't look so good.  I am holding out hope for two of them.  I am getting some new stocks ready for next year.

I have to appreciate people like Mike.  He may not have experience with grafting, dwarf conifers, or broom hunting, but he is observant of the world around him and noticed something  unusual in one of the trees near his house.

If you continue to read this blog, you will come to see that these mutations are all around us.  All it takes is the willingness to look for them.