The Holm Oak of Parque Bruil
Tenerias, Casco Historico
This is the tree the neighbourhood meets at. In February 2012 a public gathering was called with the instruction to meet at the holm oak of Parque Bruil, and the reason was not affection but alarm: work remodelling the park had cut into its root plate and the tree had no protection plan of any kind. Holm oak is the native oak of this dry country, evergreen, small dark leaves furred pale underneath, and it was one of the species Juan Bruil's French gardeners put in when they laid out these grounds after 1842, alongside mulberries and plums and a great deal of imported novelty. The city measured it at two metres forty round at chest height and fourteen metres tall in 2004, which for a species that grows slowly on thin Aragonese soil is a considerable tree. What it has watched is a long argument about who the ground belongs to. It stood in a private garden that opened to the public one day a week, then in an estate the city spent years expropriating, and since 1965 in a public park that has been dug up and rebuilt around it more than once. It is still here.
From people who stood here
No notes yet
Did you visit the tree? Leave a note for the next visitor.
Getting there
Parque Bruil, Calle Asalto, 50002 Zaragoza
You can recognise it by the leaves, small and dark and furred pale underneath, evergreen all year, on a trunk two metres forty round. It stands in Parque Bruil; the park's hackberry is wider and a metre taller.
About 10 minutes on foot east from Plaza del Pilar. The park entrance is on Calle Asalto.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from. The story was written with AI from these sources, and readers who know the tree correct it.
- In the official register: Catalogo de Arboles Singulares de Zaragoza (Ayuntamiento de Zaragoza, 2006), no. ficha 6, Encina, Parque Bruil
- zaragoza.es, arboles singulares
- zaragoza.es, anejo 3 arbolado
- biodeluna.wordpress.com
- enjoyzaragoza.es