The names of things can be confusing, misleading, or downright dangerous.

By Bill Lawyer

The names of things can be confusing, misleading, or downright dangerous.

Starfish, for example, aren’t really fish; prairie dogs aren’t dogs; guinea pigs aren’t pigs, flying foxes aren’t foxes … the list goes on.  

As I write this, there are countless horse chestnut trees blooming profusely around Rye.  A particularly beautiful one can be seen on Hill Street, along with others on Forest Avenue, Boston Post Road, and in Rye Town Park.

The horse chestnut tree is a good example of name confusion. Native to southeastern Europe, these trees spread through Europe and North America because they produced beautiful flowers and provided extensive shade as they matured.  

They were given the name horse chestnut because: (a) they produced nuts that look similar to members of the chestnut family; (b) the leaf scars on the tree branches are shaped like horseshoes (complete with nails, as one botanist puts it); and, (c) someone got the idea that they would make good food for horses.  

As a kid I became familiar with them because we had two large ones on our corner lot. It was my job to rake up the nuts and leaves every fall. And there were an awful lot of nuts coming down.  

Horse chestnut flowers grow on what is known as “panicles” — about 50 flowers per panicle. Of each panicle, about five nuts mature, covered by tough, spiky shells. While I’m not a mathematician, I would “guestimate” that that would mean more than a thousand nuts per tree.  

I remember discussing with my mother the idea of roasting those chestnuts and eating them. I loved roasted chestnuts. At least then my raking would result in something worthwhile.  

While she didn’t get into the botanical aspects of it, my mother made it clear that people should not eat horse chestnut tree nuts because they would make us sick. And, according to botanists, they’re even more hazardous for horses.  

Horse chestnuts are known scientifically as Aesculus hippocastanum. American chestnuts, on the other hand, are Castanea dentate. Not even close.  

In Lon Lewis’ 1995 book, “Care and Feeding of the Horse”, the author describes horses that have fed on horse chestnuts as “becoming tremulous and lacking in coordination.” If not treated quickly, the horse will likely die.  

While useless as food, in Britain, shelled horse chestnut nuts have long been used for a game called “Conkers”. People even call horse chestnuts conker trees.  

In Alice Bertha Gomme’s definitive work, “The Traditional Games of England, Scotland, and Ireland” (1894), she described how Conkers is played. “A hole is drilled in a large, hard conker using a nail, gimlet, small screwdriver, or electric drill. A piece of string (often a shoelace is used), about 10 inches long is threaded through it. A large knot at one or both ends of the string secures the conker. The game is played between two people, each with a conker. They take turns hitting each other’s conker using their own. One player lets the conker dangle on the full length of the string while the other player swings their conker and hits.”

The game has become extremely popular in recent years, with both national and international championships. In 2001, the world-record holder cracked 306 conkers in an hour in Ireland. Thanks to the profusion of conkers, the game is one of the least expensive competitive sports out there.  

So lets enjoy the flowers and get all the neighborhood kids out collecting and playing conkers, right in our backyards.