I have been meaning to do a post about this for some time. Helen and I did a Minsmere guided tour and the guide told us a bout a feature of reeds I have never noticed before. If you put your thumb and forefinger either side and the base of a leaf and then let the leaf slide through your finger you will notice about one third of the way up that there is a bump or ridge across the leaf. All leaves have it.
The guide told us that it is colloquially known as “the devils pinch”, which I think is a great name, somehow fitting and very colloquial. Ever since then I just can’t help running my fingers only the leaf as described above, to feel for the feature. It is just compulsive and impulsive.
I have done some googling on the subject but cannot find any reference to reeds. Some of the things I found are:
- There is a canyon some where in Austalia, on the Wolgan River, in Katoomba with the name. Apparently a bad accident with a team of horses pulling logs happened then in the 1870’s
- A few references to marks on the body similar to liver spots.
- References to a feature in a cave, perhaps where it gets really narrow, again a good name for such a place.
So now we have a reference in the reed’s Devils Pinch. I wonder how long it will take to start appearing in Google searches.
