The North Meadow Oak

One of the thickest oaks in Park Sonsbeek is also the one its surveyor is worried about. The national register groups this tree with two other heavy oaks standing near it at the northeast edge of the Sonsbeek meadow and calls the three of them among the most impressive in the park: wide crowns, real height, the kind of trees that set the tone for a whole corner of ground. Then the condition notes take over. For decades the trunk and crown were sound, and the October 2013 storm cost this one only a small branch. The 2022 survey found something else: almost no increase in girth since the previous measurement, deadwood through the crown, and weak regrowth where new shoots should have been. The surveyor's own words were that the tree appears to be declining strongly. It was alive and standing at that observation, which is the most recent evidence anyone has published, and an oak in decline can take decades over it. Worth seeing while the crown is still up. It was planted somewhere between 1810 and 1820, in a meadow that is now the park's open lawn, and it stands at the woodland edge where the grass runs out. Free, any day. If you find it in better shape than its file suggests, tell us and we will say so here.