The Wild Cherry of Passo del Cimirlo

One of Trento's 18 monumental trees stands well outside the city, at a mountain pass most residents know for hiking and old war ruins rather than for a tree. The Comune di Trento's own open register puts this wild cherry at 3.59 metres round and 26.5 metres tall, at 790 metres above sea level on public forest land managed by the province's forestry agency. Passo del Cimirlo sits between Monte Celva and the Marzola massif, linking Povo to the villages of Oltrecastello and Roncogno on an unpaved road that has carried foot and cart traffic for longer than anyone living remembers. During the First World War the Austro-Hungarian army dug trenches and built gun batteries across this ground as part of the ring of forts defending Trento; the nearby Forte Roncogno and the Batteria Cimirlo are still standing. A wild cherry this size is unusual on its own terms. Prunus avium is a fast grower and rarely a long liver by forest-tree standards, which makes a trunk over three and a half metres round a genuine rarity rather than simply an old specimen of a long-lived species. Trento added it to its monumental tree list in 2021 alongside 17 others, from a Himalayan cedar in a city park to a beech on a Monte Bondone pasture; this is the one that asks for the longest walk to see.