The Bald Cypress Twins of the Orto Botanico

Two bald cypresses stand fifteen metres apart at the pond in Lucca's botanical garden, buttressed at the base and throwing up the woody knees that let the species breathe in waterlogged ground, a trick it brought from the swamps of the American south. Both are registered as individually monumental, 3.15 and 2.80 metres round. They are the only conifer in the garden that behaves like a deciduous tree, turning rust orange and dropping its needles each autumn, which in a collection built mostly around evergreens makes the pond the one spot in the Orto Botanico with a real November moment. Nobody has recorded when either tree was planted. The garden charges standard admission and keeps published hours, unlike most of what stands on this page. Once inside, the cypresses sit a short walk from the cedar of Lebanon, redwood and three-trunked ginkgo already on this list, all reachable on one visit.