The Oak of the Neighbourhood

The register's own name for this tree translates as simply "the oak of the neighbourhood", and its own note is almost as plain: almost certainly planted when the neighbourhood itself was built. Eikenderveld, the district it stands in, was laid out in the 1920s between the railway and the green grounds of Terworm, and this oak on the little square where Markiesstraat meets Schoutstraat, Jonkerstraat and Stadhouderstraat is registered to that decade, roughly a century old. A street tree planted with a new neighbourhood is a different kind of veteran from an estate oak grown up in woodland: it has spent its whole life with pavement and front doors around it rather than other trees, which usually means more light, faster early growth and a more rounded, open crown. A hundred years is young by oak standards, well short of when an oak this size typically starts slowing down, so this is a tree with most of its life still ahead of it. Eikenderveld's own name, meaning oak field, suggests the district was named for trees like this one rather than the other way round. The register is the only source describing it specifically. If you know more, tell us.