ANYONE FOR A GAME OF CONKERS?

When our boys were younger, we always used to enjoy going out to collect the seed of the horse chestnut tree in the autumn.  We would bring them home, make a hole with one of my skewers, attach a piece of string, and they were ready to play Conkers.  I don’t think many children play this game now - and perhaps part of the problem is that there aren’t so many conkers about.  I have just been reading up about the game and apparently, our friends Across the Pond call them “Buckeyes”. 

The other problem, of course, is ‘Elf and Safety - in schools these days, children aren’t allowed to play the game unless they are wearing gloves and goggles in case someone gets hurt!  Well, children soon learn that if they get hit on the knuckle with a hard conker, they need to be more careful the next time - Mr. HCB says it’s just one of the hazards of the game!

We have noticed that the horse chestnut trees near where we live have been looking very diseased for some time and when I went across the road to search for conkers today, I was very saddened to see that many of the “seeds” were looking like the one in my photograph.  The disease is caused by the horse chestnut leaf-mining moth, a small moth with caterpillars that feed inside the leaves, causing brown or white blotch mines to develop between the leaf veins.  

In just a decade, the caterpillar of the horse chestnut leaf-mining moth has munched its way across most of England and Wales, turning leaves brown months early and shrinking conkers.  Apparently, one of the ways to get rid of the disease is to collect the leaves up and destroy them, but of course, that isn’t going to happen when there are so many trees and Councils don’t have the money and the resources to do that. 

There are still quite a few good conkers though - see my extra photograph - but as yet, I haven’t seen any young lads collecting them.  Perhaps they are all sitting indoors playing on their consoles and don’t even realise the sheer joy of playing games outside.  

"Play is not frivolous. 
It is not a luxury. 
It is not something to fit in 
after completing all the important stuff. 
Play IS the important stuff. 
Play is a drive, 
a need, 
a brain-building must-do." 
Jeff A. Johnson & Denita Dinger 
Let Them Play