What is the oldest tree in Horaiji?
Horaiji's best-known tree is Kasa sugi, a Japanese cedar about 800 years old by tradition and once recorded as Japan's tallest tree, between 59.6 and 60.8 metres depending on the survey. It stands beside the 1,425 stone steps that climb Mount Horaiji, above the Nio-mon gate. A second tree, a temple juniper called Nezu no Ki, grows further down the same stairway; sources disagree on its age by more than a thousand years.
Kasa means umbrella, and the name is literal: the upper trunk of this cedar fans into limbs in every direction, so from the steps below the crown reads as an open parasol. The base measures about 7.5 metres round. For decades it held the record as Japan's tallest tree; a cedar at Hanase, north of Kyoto, was measured at 62.3 metres in 2017 and now holds it instead. Its age is given everywhere as about 800 years, tradition rather than measurement. Further down the same stairway stands Nezu no Ki, a temple juniper. A Commons photo caption gives it as over 1,400 years old; the local newspaper, reporting on a museum exhibition of the city's designated monuments, says roughly 300, and calls it the largest and oldest Nezu juniper west of Kanagawa Prefecture. Restoration work in 1996 brought its vigour back after decline. Reach the mountain by JR Iida Line to Honagashino Station, then the Toyotetsu bus to Horaiji, or about 20 minutes by car from Shinshiro IC. The path itself is free; a toll parkway serves drivers.
One of Horaiji's trees also appears in The Thickest Trunks We Have Measured, a themed collection spanning several cities.