The Stadtpark Caucasian Wingnut

The only tree in Graz's Stadtpark with a fence of its own is a Caucasian wingnut from the park's first planting. Its crown spreads so wide that it has to be propped up, and since 2010 the fence has kept visitors out from under it, so a falling branch cannot land on anyone. The Stadtpark was laid out between 1869 and 1872 under mayor Moritz Ritter von Franck. Local guides place this wingnut in that first planting around 1870, which makes it one of the oldest trees in the park and roughly 150 years old. That age rests on the park's founding, not on a planting record or a tape measure. Nobody has published a girth. If you have measured the trunk, tell us. Count it forward and it was already a big tree when Austria-Hungary came apart in 1918, and it stood here through both world wars. It is still going. A walking group found it in full leaf in May 2025. The best of it is underfoot. In March and April the ground beneath it turns blue with squill, a carpet the city's gardeners are proud of. Squill and wingnut come from the same part of the world, the Caucasus. The park is free and open, a few minutes' walk from the old town, and the tree stands in its northern part. You see it from the fence, which is as close as anyone gets.