Baba Zakura

On 1 March 2018 a gale pushed this cherry over at the base. Villagers and a local preservation society cut back the broken upper trunk and hauled what was left upright again, packed the roots and went to work on it. It is still standing, and it still flowers each April, sparsely, from the young branches it has left. Baba Zakura is an Edo-higan cherry in the grounds of Fukumitsu Kokuzo-do temple, a National Natural Monument since December 1936 and a Fukushima Green Cultural Property since 1983. Otama Village puts its age at around a thousand years. That is a figure carried down locally rather than one derived from a measurement, so take it as tradition. The name means the cherry of the riding ground. The story told here is that Minamoto no Yoshiie, campaigning north during the Later Three Years' War, pushed a cherry-wood riding whip into the earth to tether his horses, and the whip rooted; the field around it was where his cavalry trained. Farmers put the tree to plainer use. When it bloomed, it was time to sow rice, which is why it is also known as the seed-sowing cherry. The 1936 survey found it 21 metres tall with a trunk 7.45 metres round. The village's own figures today are 15 metres and 7 metres. The difference is what the last ninety years took.