What is the oldest tree in Motosu?
Motosu's only mapped tree is Usuzumi-zakura, an Edo-higan cherry traditionally dated to around 1,500 years old on a legend that Emperor Keitai's predecessor planted it around 467 CE. It stands in Usuzumi Park in the Neo valley of Gifu Prefecture, free and open at any hour, a 15 minute walk from Tarumi Station.
Usuzumi-zakura grows in Usuzumi Park in the Neo valley of Motosu, Gifu Prefecture, and takes its name, pale ink, from the way its white blossom fades to a grey-tinged wash as it goes over each spring. Legend credits the planting to Odo no Okimi, later Emperor Keitai, around 467 CE, before he left the valley for the capital, which is where the traditional age of roughly 1,500 years comes from; treat it as legend rather than a planting record. In 1948 Japan's Ministry of Education inspected the tree and gave it three years to live. A Gifu dentist named Toshiyuki Maeda spent the following month cutting away 238 dying roots and grafting in new ones, and by 1950 the tree had recovered; it has since taken typhoons and is still flowering. It was designated a National Natural Monument on 12 October 1922, the same day as Jindai-zakura and Miharu Takizakura, together making up the Three Great Cherry Trees of Japan.
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