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["Sage Austin | Eureka! Design" <eureka AT hctc.net>]

"Lichens growing on trees (and throughout the ecosystem), each posessing 
their own unique chemistries, also leach substantial quantities of 
secondary metabolites, which each combine in unique ways with those of 
their host plants. Lichens are a symbiosis of two organisms, a fungal 
mycelia and an alga, that come together to form one plant. In a sense 
they are a kind of mycelia that can live outside the soil; the alga 
protects the internal mycelial core (from such things as drying out) 
much as the soil does. The exterior alga and the interior mycelial core 
possess their own unique biochemistries while, in combination, they 
produce synergistic compounds unique to their combination as a lichen. 
In the case of Usnea lichens the exterior covering is highly 
antibacterial while the inner mycelial core, composed of complex 
polysaccharides, is strongly immune potentiating. Lichens release these 
compounds into their tree hosts to support their hosts' health and also 
leach the into the system during rainfall. The tree lichens growing in a 
hectare (2.5 acres) of oak woods can weigh 1,500 pounds and their 
chemistries significantly alter throughfall water chemsitry"

Johannes Knops, et al., "The influence of piphytic lichens on the 
nutrient cycling of an oak wood," in Ecological Monographs (May 1996) 
www.nothernlights.com, excerpted from Stephen Harrod Buhner's "Lost 
Language of Plants".

--Sage

Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:
>   
> > > What kind of lichen?  Are they cutting out light/air movement or????
> > >       
>
> Enough lichens on the bark causes the bark to deteriorate and introduces 
> bacterial diseases and harmful fungus.  I lost a whole grove of cherry trees due 
> to allowing the lichens to grow too thickly on them.  Pity too, really good 
> Montmorency trees that produced heavily.  
>
> Now I make the bark a hostile environent for lichens and fungus by treating 
> the bark with a weak copper solution.
>
> James
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