The Glasnevin Caucasian Elm

A nurseryman in County Offaly once took cuttings from this exact tree and started selling clones of it. Zelkova carpinifolia 'Glasnevin' is a named cultivar, propagated by Jan Ravensberg from material taken off this specific specimen in the National Botanic Gardens, one of the more unusual honours a single tree in Dublin has received: not just admired, but copied and put into commercial circulation under its own place name. The species itself, the Caucasian elm, comes from the mountains between the Black Sea and the Caspian, and grows into a distinctive multi-stemmed, upright vase shape rather than the single trunk most elms produce, its bark smooth grey brown until age begins to plate it. Unlike Ireland's native elms, decimated by Dutch elm disease through the twentieth century, Zelkova carpinifolia carries strong natural resistance to the fungus, part of why old specimens like this one still stand where true elms mostly do not. The Tree Council of Ireland's 2009 heritage survey puts it at 150 to 200 years old then, roughly 165 to 215 now, the oldest of the garden's newly catalogued specimens, though no source gives a firm planting date. Autumn turns it a rich copper before the leaves drop. It stands 200 metres from Addison's Walk, well within the same visit.