HAWTHORN(Crateagus sp.) This beautiful, low, wide branching tree readily invades dry, rocky cleared land and fencerows. There, Hawthorn acts as a ‘nurse tree’, providing shade and shelter for younger tree seedlings that will eventually overgrow its protector. The dry but edible haws are an important source of food for birds. Today, as in the past, Hawthorn teas and tinctures are administered for many heart and circulation-related problems, and are even used as sedatives. Hawthorns have such an enormous range of variation in character that they have long provided nightmares for taxonomists. Rather than taking that on, I decided to stick with a more generic specimen for this wall hanging!