Mendaza is a village in Navarre's Berrueza valley, and the tree on this map stands well outside it, on a hillside path toward a hermitage. The Encina Tres Patas, the Three-Legged Oak, is hollow through the trunk and stands on three thick buttresses instead of one round stem. Spain's environment ministry named it the country's longest-lived tree in 2007, and it was a European Tree of the Year finalist in 2020. Local tradition puts it at around twelve hundred years old.
0 / 1 bezocht in Mendaza
Foto: Javier Hermoso De Mendoza (CC BY-SA 2.0 es)
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Encina Tres Patas de Mendaza
Holm Oak (Quercus ilex) · roughly 1,200 years, by local tradition; no ring study published · Countryside outside Mendaza village
This oak's trunk is not a trunk. It is three thick buttresses standing around a hollow core, which is where the name comes from: the Encina Tres Patas, the Three-Legged Oak, and from a distance the three legs really do look like they are holding the crown up on their own.
It stands on a hillside in Navarre's Berrueza valley, on the path between Mendaza village and the Ermita de Santa Coloma. Spanish Wikipedia, Wikidata and a regional travel blog agree closely on its size: a girth of 770 centimetres, a height of 15.5 metres, a crown spreading 19.2 metres. Metal bands were fitted around the hollow at some point to stop it splitting further, a repair rather than a sign of trouble; Wikipedia describes it as showing excellent condition and vitality.
Local tradition puts it at roughly 1,200 years old, which would make it one of the oldest living things in Spain, though nobody has backed that figure with a ring count. In 2007 Spain's environment ministry gave it the national award for the country's longest-lived tree anyway, and in 2020 it reached the top ten of European Tree of the Year. The Government of Navarre declared it a Natural Monument in 1991.
A waymarked circular walk between the village and the hermitage passes right by it. If you know of a study that has actually dated it, tell us.
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