The August Reiss Oak of Offenbach
This oak was planted around 1590, which makes it older than the Thirty Years War and, by the City of Offenbach's own count, the oldest tree in Offenbach. The city's forest route and a 1979 survey of its natural monuments agree on the date. It is also tall: over 40 metres by the city, about 40 by the survey, near the top of what a pedunculate oak reaches, and nobody has published a newer measurement. The trunk is almost two metres across. That works out at roughly six metres round, which is our arithmetic from the diameter, not anyone's tape. The name honours August Reiss, 1844 to 1929, forestry inspector of the princely Isenburg forests from 1874 to 1927. When he started, the oak was nearly three hundred. The oak is stop 10 on Offenbach's signed Waldroute, on the path over the bridge near the Pechschneise, about 300 metres east of the road to Dietzenbach. The city warns that bushes have grown up around it. The forest is free, with no gate. The list of Offenbach's natural monuments records two other oaks as gone, one fallen and one felled in 2019, and the newest photograph of this one is from August 2020; if you have seen it since, tell us. Offenbach is its own city, an S-Bahn ride from Frankfurt, and the oak is a forest walk of about three kilometres south of its centre. Check RMV for the journey.
In fruit
The line is our estimate of how much there is to see, not a measurement. Typical for this species where this tree stands; exact weeks shift with the year.
Offenbach city forest, on the forest route near the Pechschneise, about 300 m east of the road to Dietzenbach, Offenbach am Main (day trip from Frankfurt)You can recognise it by its height, about 40 metres, and the bushes grown up round its trunk. It stands at stop 10 of the Waldroute, by the path over the bridge near the Pechschneise.
Free. Stands beside a public forest path on the city's own signed Waldroute (the oak is stop 10, 'on the path over the bridge near the Pechschneise'); the city page says it is overgrown with bushes. Forest, no gate.
Offenbach am Main is S-Bahn-connected to Frankfurt (travel time not verified); the oak is a forest walk roughly 3 km south of the Offenbach centre. Nearest stop not verified; check RMV.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.
