The Great Pine of L'Espinau

Some 480 metres from the great oak stands a pine that was protected on the same day. The two trees at Ca n'Iglesies in Osor were both declared monumental in 1990 and both sit inside the Guilleries designated natural area, and together they are the only pair of protected trees within walking distance of each other anywhere near Girona. This one is 29 metres tall with a trunk 3.16 metres round and a crown 16.5 metres across. It is a Spanish black pine, the salzmannii subspecies, which is the mountain pine of inland Iberia and grows on limestone and poor ground where almost nothing else will make timber; its wood was used for ship masts and beams because it grows straight and its resin content makes it slow to rot. Seeing one at 29 metres in the wet valleys of the Guilleries is a little unexpected, since the subspecies is more at home on dry limestone further west. The register lists it as being in normal condition. No age is published, and the pairing with the oak is the reason to make this the stop it is.