The Green Ash of Hagley Museum

The most remarkable thing about Delaware's champion green ash is that it is still standing. The emerald ash borer, a beetle from Asia, has killed most of the ash trees in Delaware since the 2010s, and this one, at Hagley, was still alive when the Delaware Forest Service ranked it first in the state at the end of October 2024. It is a big tree by any measure: 42.7 metres tall, a crown averaging about 31 metres across, and a trunk 422 centimetres round. The only other green ash we publish with a measured trunk, in Barcelona, is 320 centimetres. For a species most people know as a modest street tree, 42 metres is a lot of ash. We hold one more sign of life: a dated observation at the spot within the last four years. Beyond that we cannot vouch for it, and with the borer in the state, we would rather say so plainly than imply it is safe. If you visit Hagley, tell us whether the tree is still standing and whether the crown looks healthy. A photograph would help more than anything. It grows on the grounds of Hagley, the museum estate about four kilometres northwest of downtown Wilmington, outside the city. Entry is paid. The register gives no age and we have found no planting date, so if you know its history, tell us that as well.