Excerpt:
Here we are with Crab Apple, the wild ancestor of all our common apples.  The vigorously pollinating wild companion that nourishes the ecosystem.  The intimate partner of lichen, themselves a wild multispecies commune.  Crab Apple’s flowering season is earlier and longer, giving our native bees and honey bees a reliable meal before other trees bloom and berry.  Wherever she stands, she helps prevent erosion thanks to her deep root systems, which also help clean water by filtering out toxins before they reach nearby streams and rivers.  Her branches are crooked and intertwined, perhaps giving rise to her name which may come from the word crabbed, meaning the crooked or wayward gait of a crab. These tiny apple forbears persist through the colder seasons, a delight for winter birds seeking nourishment. Look below a crab apple tree and find a party of worms, microbes, insects, caterpillars, mice, voles, foxes, rabbits, deer and more feasting on the bounty. Crab Apple need kin to fertilize, they cannot do it alone. Each new crab apple seed that takes root can grow into many different varieties, making Crab Apple’s family large and deep. As these baby Crab Apple’s grow, they create a collective all working together. Slice open any crab apple and find a star deep within, reminding us of the magical network wild Crab Apple lives within.  This wildness is ancient, ancestral, sometimes bitter, fruitful, interconnected, and life giving.