Toys for two!

[naturestee]

I had to share this. I put a new chewtoy in Fey and Sprite's pen just a little bit ago. I made itfrom those thin flexible weeping willow branches- stripped of leaves,braided together, and dried in the oven. Then I tied it totheir cage, and took pics. It's in several pieces now, butthey still like it. Mocha and Loki love this stuff too, but Idon't have pics. Thankfully I made lots, and it's free!

 

[bbgrl20]

Too cute! Where do you get the willow branches??:hearts:

 

[naturestee]

There's a park near me that has lots of hugeweeping willow trees. I have some big thick branches fromthem that fell down in a storm, and those are pretty populartoo. The really thin branches are very flexible, so James andI spent some time cutting fresh ones and braiding them.

 

[TrixieRabbit]

I THINK I have a weeping willow outside my house. How can I tell for sure? Are there any other kind of trees that have the long, droopy branches? The one outside does. It's very droopy with a lot of long, dangling branches, they almost touch the ground!
I want to try this for Trixie

 

[naturestee]

All willows *should* be safe as long as they haven't had chemicals sprayed on them. If you take a picture of the tree and a close-up of a branch with leaves on, I might be able to tell. I'm not very good with horticultural varieties though- some are pretty bizarre. Another way to find out would be to trim a small branch off and take it in to a tree farm, good gardening center, or a botanical garden and see if one of the experts there can identifiy it for you.

I studied plant taxonomy in school and I still have the reference books, so I'm fairly confident with trees that I can see in person. I've forgotten a lot, but I still remember a lot of the basics.