h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It was very windy last night, the first of the big winds of Autumn, so there were a lot of conker (horse chestnut) cases on the ground this morning as I walked to work. I found a few ripe ones and got my first conkers of the season.

Chestnuts are really the most beautiful things when they are straight out of the case. They are shiny and have beautiful swirly, brown patterns on them. They turn dull over a few days, but that's part of the attraction - the transience of them.

The patterns and hues really are a work of art, aren't they? They were very prolific in a small village where my family built a cottage in the early 70s, and I loved to collect them.

The chestnut trees over here are usually trimmed pretty hard. I was quite surprised when seeing some chestnut trees in Kew Gardens that I think had been allowed to grow freely - the branches were hanging down almost touching the ground.

Ah yes, here's one of the photos I took:
http://bp3.blogger.com/_2wEDcw5XJE0/R_JzGXESIYI/AAAAAAAAAIM/jvY-d93VZVg/s1600-h/kew29.jpg

You're so right about the fascination of opening the cases and revealing the incredible shiny newness of conkers.

I always think of this when people are described as having chestnut brown hair.

A few years ago in the UK we had a widespread attack of bleeding canker, which seemed as if it would wipe out all the horse chestnuts. I remember visiting Kew and seeing all the blighted trees in the roads nearby.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleeding_Canker_of_Horse_Chestnut

Fortunately, many trees appear to have recovered.

I remember large amounts of them in Paris. I thought at the time that the vegetation was rather one-sided and what would happen if that tree disease hit the town.

I haven't seen any horse chestnuts, or edible chestnuts yet, but the walnut tree in our garden has started dropping fruit. Or rather nuts.

I am glad I am not the only one who loves conkers Gnomon, and not for playing conkers, which some have banned over here as too dangerous i just love the shiny, glossy look and shape, and for me it is the first real sign of Autumn. It is a shame they can't stay that way, instead of drying out and shrivelling up.

Websailor