Sunken Lawn Ginkgo, Bute Park

For a few days each November this tree turns the north-east side of the Sunken Lawn gold, then drops every leaf at once. It is Glamorgan's champion ginkgo, recorded in 2015 as the largest in the county and still growing hard. Its girth went from 3.02 metres in 2015 to 3.36 metres in 2023, and it stands 22 metres tall. Ginkgo is the last survivor of a family of trees that was already ancient when the dinosaurs were alive. It was wild in only a few corners of China by the time temple gardeners there and in Japan took it up, and it reached European gardens in the 18th century. Bute Park has a whole avenue of them running from the castle to the Mews. This one stands apart from that avenue, near Fishers Bridge. The park's survey records its size but not its age, and no planting date has turned up. If you know when it went in, tell us. The rest of the year it is easy to walk past, a tall, upright crown of fan-shaped leaves on an ordinary lawn. Come in November instead. The gold lasts a short time, and when the leaves come down they come down nearly together, leaving a yellow circle on the grass around the trunk.