Perušić is a small municipality in Croatia's Lika region, in the hill country below Velebit, and its mapped tree is the largest common fir left standing in Europe. Locals call it Jela Car, the emperor fir, because every other silver fir on this stretch of forest grows to ordinary size while this one did not. A 2025 survey ahead of conservation work put it at 42.5 metres tall and 5.42 metres round; some tourist accounts claim more. Nobody has confirmed its age, though the park that manages it says it is at least several centuries old.
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Foto: Fraxinus Croat (CC BY-SA 3.0)
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Jela Car
Silver Fir (Abies alba) · contested: commonly said to be over 500 years, but never scientifically confirmed · Bovan forest, near Bakovac Kosinjski
Every other fir on this stretch of Velebit grows to a normal size. This one did not get the memo: locals named it Jela Car, the emperor fir, because among an entire forest of silver firs it stands alone, tall enough that Croatia's own foresters call it the largest common fir left in Europe.
The numbers, when anyone has bothered to measure them, are startling on their own. A 2025 survey ahead of conservation work put it at 42.5 metres tall with a trunk 5.42 metres round, big enough that three grown men linking hands cannot reach around it. Some tourist accounts report an even larger tree, 47.5 metres and 5.9 metres round, though without saying who measured it or when, so the more carefully sourced figures are used here.
Its age is the one thing nobody will commit to. It is commonly said to be over 500 years old, and Park prirode Velebit, which manages the tree, states plainly that this has never been scientifically confirmed: estimates run from several centuries to, by some guesses, close to a thousand years.
The tree stands in forest above the village of Bakovac Kosinjski, reached by a two-kilometre walk along a forest road. In July 2025 park rangers removed mistletoe and dead branches from its crown, the kind of quiet maintenance that keeps an emperor standing.
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