Pipe dreams

One of the small trees we inherited with this garden is a Tree Heather ( Erica arborea ). It is 12 feet tall and covered with Heather type flowers.
It originates in the Mediterranean and East Africa.

The wood of its roots is known as briar root. It is extremely hard and heat resistant and is traditionally used for making smoking pipes.

The football sized root tubers are harvested at the age of 30 to 60 years. They are cooked for several hours then dried for several months before being used.

I expect the many pipes used by Simenon’s French detective, Maigret, were made in this way. This came to mind because I am currently reading all 75 of the Maigret novels !