Sommerlinde of Hochneukirchen (NÖ-Naturdenkmal WB-032)

The old lime on Lindenstraße in Hochneukirchen is slowly swallowing the sign that protects it. Photographs taken in 2014 show the trunk growing over its old Naturdenkmal plate, the bark closing in around the notice that declares it a natural monument. That protection goes back a long way. Lower Austria designated this large-leaved lime on 8 May 1938, eight weeks after Austria was annexed to Germany, and the register entry, WB-032, is still in force. It records a tree 20 metres tall, with a crown 16 metres across and a trunk 5.4 metres round. The trunk is hollow, and the cavity shows in photographs taken from the road. The register puts its age at about 650 years, which would have it growing here since the fourteenth century. Read that as the register's figure rather than a measurement. A lime 5.4 metres round can be very old, but the usual growth rates for the species would read the same trunk as somewhat younger, and a hollow tree keeps no rings to settle the argument. A photograph from April 2025 shows it still standing. Beyond the register we found nothing written about it: no legend, no planting story, no local history naming who put it here or why. Hochneukirchen is a small village near the Styrian and Burgenland borders, and a car is the realistic way in. If you know what the village says about its lime, or have stood under it lately, tell us.