What is the oldest tree in Ronda?
The oldest tree near Ronda is the Castano Santo at Istan, a sweet chestnut whose official register sheet puts it at possibly around 800 years. Its trunk measures 14.65 metres round at chest height and 21.5 metres at the base, and it is named for a mass Christian troops heard at its foot in the sixteenth century.
Andalusia's singular-tree register publishes a measured sheet for each tree, so the ages here can be read against something. The Castano Santo's sheet gives 24.5 metres of height, 14.65 metres of girth at 1.30 metres and 21.5 at the base, and says the age possibly runs to around 800 years; the word possibly is the register's and this page keeps it. The Tejo de Froncaile is the more interesting case, because its sheet shows its working. It reasons from published dendrological studies that a yew of five metres girth is generally 500 to 600 years old, notes that this one measures 4.50 and grows in poor conditions that slow it further, and concludes its presence may go back five centuries. That is an estimate with a stated basis rather than a number on a board, and it is the kind this site repeats. The pinsapos are dated more loosely: the Escaleretas fir is put at 350 to 550 years. Getting to the Castano Santo: a few metres off a bridle path above Istan, about 40 minutes from Ronda by car.
See more themed collections of remarkable trees.