Trainiškis Oak (successor)

This is the youngest tree on this list and genetically it is one of the oldest. The original Trainiškis oak, reckoned at around 800 years, 6.15 metres round and protected since 1960, came down in a windstorm on the night of 5 October 2016 and was struck off the state register the year after. A graft of it was raised at the nursery in Kėdainiai, and on 12 May 2017 the Aukštaitija and Labanoras park authorities planted that clone beside the fallen trunk at a public ceremony. Same genes, different roots, nine growing seasons in the ground. So be clear about what you will find: a young oak, not an ancient one. It has none of the old tree's dimensions and none of its history, and we are not lending it either. The old trunk is still lying where it fell, deliberately. The park refused to clear it, because deadwood of that age is habitat, and a rare bracket fungus listed in Lithuania's Red Data Book was found growing on it. The park calls the site the elder and the young one, and both are signposted from the village road near the southeastern shore of Lake Baluošas. Which makes this a visit about time rather than size. Standing beside the wreck of an 800-year-old oak while its copy gets on with year nine is worth the detour off the lake road.