Some plants can be called thieves. Mistletoe is one of them. It grows on trees and steals water and minerals from them. It uses the water and minerals to make food. Mistletoe cannot grow on from the soil as most green plants do.
The white berries of mistletoe plants are the favorite food of some kinds of birds. A bird often eats the juicy part of the berries and then cleans the seeds off its beak on the bark of a tree. The seed then starts to grow. The baby plant sends rootlets into the tree trunk. They begin to soak up the water and minerals which the tree has taken from the soil for its own use. Soon the mistletoe plant has green leaves. In time it has yellow flowers and, not long afterward, white berries.
Mistletoe grows on many kinds of trees. A single plant may grow to be as big as a barrel. In the southern United States there may be so much mistletoe on a tree that it is hard to see the tree. Some trees die because they have too much mistletoe stealing nourishment from them.
Mistletoe is gathered and sold at Christmas time. With its white, waxy berries and green, leather like leaves it makes pretty Christmas decorations. Hanging up mistletoe at Christmas time is an old custom. Anyone standing under it may be kissed. Long ago in Europe mistletoe was supposed to have magic powers.
