Wales's oldest oak tree blown down

[whitewind]

Wales's oldest oak tree blown down

The Pontfadog oak, which is 1,285 years old, has been knocked down by the wind

The tree was blown down during galeforce winds on Wednesday night. The oldest oak in Wales – and probably one of the oldest oak trees in northern Europe – has grown in the Ceiriog Valley near Chirk, north Wales, since 802 and measured 12.9m in girth. Legend states that the Welsh prince Owain Gwynedd rallied his army under the tree in 1157, before defeating the English King Henry ll at the nearby battle of Crogen, and that the tree was spared when Henry had his men cut down the Ceiriog woods in 1165

[waterboy 2.0]

“The Oak At The Gate of the Dead”. What a grand looking thing.

[qualia]

pity.

all things come to an end though.

its time had come.

Edited April 20, 2013 by qualia

[planthelper]

it could still regrow if given a chance!

some roots are still ok it seems.

[whitewind]

Hope someone did some cuttings before she went, I think that's it for her I don't think oaks sucker readily do they? Surprised they didn't get a crane in to winch her back upright and cut back some of those branches, see if they could save her

[CβL]

I think that it's possibly a little bit misguided to heavily spend resources on so ancient a tree. I think nature would prefer 50 planted saplings to keeping alive a tree beyond what its own means can.

[waterboy 2.0]

^ .....reportedly telling friends that "I can't believe I burned down a tree older than Jesus."

damn, now I am convinced of the dangers of meth..lol.

[theuserformallyknownasd00d]

Hahaha holy shit!!

[whitewind]

Lets find that Wollemi grove, build a fire, ingest some Datura and dance around for a bit, see if we can't create some hellish mayhem of our own.

I'd love to be able to say "I can't believe I have killed trees that are older than dinosaurs".

[CβL]

I think that was the tree that got burned down. :/

[whitewind]

I wonder how long that oak continued to produce acorns? Except that human clearing would have skewed the results, it would have been interesting to do some DNA testing to see how many of the local oaks are actually descended from this old beast compared to the rest.