Attached is a drawing of an experiment I tried this weekend, using a Wimshurst machine as the electrostatic generator. Some were thicker than a pencil, and all seemed to spread out as they reached into the fog. Odds are that my electrostatic generator was producing a much higher voltage than the 5-10K which Bill used.
Many mysteries remain.
The fog sure whirled around some of the holes. For now, I have no further details now only to say this anomaly was noticed, discussed and somewhat forgotten. It describes the spectacular behavior of molten rosin when it is electrified with an electrostatic machine. A pool of molten rosin sitting placidly in a conducting ladle will come alive when charged. It forms tiny, streaming filamentous jets that spurt upward and outward for an appreciable distance in long, straight, spaced apart lines.