Yew tree berries

[illmonkey]

My garden is absolutely covered in these buggers. Do they ever stop? I hose/wipe them down and the next day everything is covered again. I'd like to be able to walk around the table in the winter still, but they are making it too messy.

I can't find anything on the net next about seaions etc.

[Sam_68]

Yes, they stop.

They are a pain in the arse while they're still dropping, but they'll be gone soon.

[mrmaggit]

They are supposed to be good food for the garden birds, but the birds in our garden don't touch them.

[illmonkey]

Apart from the seeds, which are poisonous.

Trying to order a cover for my table. I may just get a big sheet of plastic and tie it to all corners of the garden.

[5MUG]

We had three yew trees in our garden all around the back door. Two of them were female and produced berries. My lab almost died as he had been hoovering up the berries and had added some gravel to the mix. The gravel had ground up the pips in his stomach and released the poison. It was a horrible time and he was very poorly. As we are in a conservation area we had to apply to the council for permission to chop them down. They approved our application and we are now 2 trees less and it is great. So they can be dangerous too. Watch out if you have pets.

[Sam_68]

Bit of useless information: apparently the Romans and others used to make a glue from yew berries (presumably by boiling them down to extract the horrible sticky glop that covers them), which was then daubed over twigs and branches to catch songbirds to eat.

[5MUG]

Yum yum.