By the old priory at Groenendaal, there are plenty of Lindens (Tilleul, Linde) and this year they seem to bear a heavier-than-normal harvest of the nutlets. They are not ready to disperse just yet, they are still green, but later in the year, when they harden, the wind will carry them gently spinning afar, courtesy of the bract acting as a little vane.
This has been going on for time immemorial. Ruusbroec’s linden once stood not far away, on the way up to the old racecourse, under which he would contemplate God and his works half a millennium ago. Nearby, there is an immense four-stemmed specimen, probably around 200 years old itself. I like to think we are looking at a direct lineage from Ruusbroec’s linden which in turn had ancestors of its own.
The Forest changes, along a continuum.