The Turkish Hazels of Resselpark

Vienna protected these two trees for looking alike. Naturdenkmal Nr. 545, granted on 25 April 1972, covers a pair of Turkish hazels standing opposite the main entrance of the Technical University, and the reason recorded for the designation is their uniform growth and their appearance as a pair, not anything about either tree on its own. They are not twins. The city tree catalogue dates one to 1900 and the other to 1917, seventeen years apart, with trunks of 281 and 237 centimetres, and they stand about thirty metres from each other in the same sightline. That they grew into a matched pair regardless says something about the species. Corylus colurna is the tree-sized hazel of the Balkans, Anatolia and the Caucasus, and it builds a stubbornly regular cone on one straight trunk, which is why cities plant it along streets and why these two arrived at the same silhouette from different decades. It is also why they are the oldest trees in this small park and still look like street furniture rather than veterans. Resselpark is named for Josef Ressel, who patented a screw propeller in 1827 and watched other people make it work. It lies between the Karlsplatz and the Karlskirche, so the hazels look straight at Fischer von Erlach's dome and its two carved columns, and the Secession building is five minutes west. Both trees stand on open public ground at any hour.