Veteran trees of the Moravian Karst: 20 trees and 2 avenues worth a detour

The Moravian Karst has 20 protected veteran trees and 2 protected avenues (known in Czech as “památné stromy” and “památné aleje”). The stoutest is a beech in Babický les with a girth of 513 cm, though only a dead stump of it remains today. The tallest is a three-trunked larch near Habrůvka, at 43 metres. The best story belongs to the Novodvorská alej, 70 lime trees that won the first-ever Avenue of the Year poll in 2011. Most of the trees lie off the tourist trails, which is precisely why they are worth the trip: they take you to places you would otherwise never find.

QUICK LINKS 🌳 Record-breakers · 🛣 The two avenues · 📋 Full list · 🚶 Where to head first · ❓ FAQ

Record-breakers

The beech in Babický les: 513 cm around

The most massive veteran tree in the whole karst. It was protected on 20 October 1995 with a girth of 513 cm and a height of 25 metres. At the latest assessment, however, the Protected Landscape Area (CHKO) administration noted that it is now a dead stump.

That does not mean it is not worth seeking out. A dead beech of this size is a habitat in its own right: the old timber is home to beetles, fungi and mosses you will struggle to find elsewhere. The CHKO administration deliberately leaves part of the forests in the first zone unmanaged, precisely so that dead wood can stay where it falls.

The three-trunked larch near Habrůvka: 43 metres

The tallest tree on the list. It has a girth of 458 cm and a height of 43 metres, and above all, its trunk splits into three at a height of roughly 2.5 metres, hence the name. It was protected as long ago as 14 October 1982 and grows in dense forest.

Habrůvecký smrk: 42 metres

Right next door and only a metre shorter. Girth 312 cm, height 42 metres, protected on the very same day in 1982. Its lower branches are dried out because the surrounding forest shades it, but otherwise it is a vigorous, mature tree.

So Habrůvka has two of the tallest trees in the entire protected landscape area within its boundaries. It is a village that grew up on the karst plateau because of iron ore rather than farming, just like Rudice and Babice.

The lime tree by Hřebenáč: 483 cm

The stoutest living veteran tree in the karst. Girth 483 cm, height 22 metres, protected on 18 February 1997 and treated by an arborist in 2013. It stands by Hřebenáč in Sloup, a rock tower that is also an approved climbing spot. Combining a visit to the lime with a stroll to the Sloup-Šošůvka Caves (Sloupsko-šošůvské jeskyně) is a matter of a few minutes.

Smrk u jeskyně Výpustek: protected 1975

The oldest entry on the list. Girth 406 cm, height 35 metres, protected in 1975 by the then district national committee (ONV) of Brno-venkov. It stands by the entrance to the Výpustek Cave (jeskyně Výpustek), which makes it the only veteran tree in the karst that almost twenty thousand people walk past every year, and hardly anyone knows it is there.

The two avenues

Novodvorská alej: Avenue of the Year 2011

Seventy small-leaved limes, plus one large-leaved lime and one field maple. Girths range from 150 to 450 cm, heights from 25 to 30 metres. Protected on 28 September 1994.

There are two reasons why this is the most interesting entry on the whole list:

First, it won the very first Avenue of the Year poll in 2011. Not by decision of some authority, but by public vote.

Second, it was saved by volunteers. Restoration took place between 2008 and 2012, as a collaboration between the CHKO administration and volunteer activists, and was funded partly from the Landscape Care Programme and partly from the O2 Think Big foundation programme. It is also the only tree or avenue in the CHKO that Lesy ČR (the state forestry company) lists as a Významný strom Lesů ČR (a “Significant Tree of Lesy ČR”).

The most demanding section to look after is the stretch in the hamlet of Nové Dvory, where the trees stand close to people’s homes and safety requirements are at their highest.

Jedovnická alej: 166 trees along the road

Officially the Lažánky–Jedovnice tree-lined road. Protected on 14 October 1982, it is a giant: 72 ash trees, 52 small-leaved limes (the largest with girths of up to 480 cm and heights of 28 metres), 16 large-leaved limes, 14 Norway maples and 12 sycamores. Only part of it reaches into the CHKO.

It does, however, have a problem you can see plainly from the car: it runs alongside a busy main road for motor vehicles. In the past, the main limbs on the road side of the trees were cut off, often unprofessionally. The result is twofold: a greater risk of fungal infection in the wounds, and a dangerously high centre of gravity in the trees. In 2015, the Jihomoravský kraj Road Administration and Maintenance (Správa a údržba silnic JMK) therefore carried out a restoration project: trees in a dangerous condition were felled, the rest were treated by an arborist, and the avenue was replanted.

I write about the village at the end of the avenue in my article on Jedovnice.

Full list of veteran trees

Four of these were added to the list fairly recently, in 2011, and all lie within the cadastral areas of Suchdol v Moravském krasu and Vavřinec v Moravském krasu.

In addition to the officially protected trees, the CHKO administration keeps a record of other individual trees of exceptional size, shape or age. Most of them grow in the villages themselves.

Where to head first

Hruška u Zouharova závrtu is my personal recommendation. An old pear tree with a girth of 280 cm, growing beside a sinkhole, is exactly the picture that makes it worth heading to the karst plateaus rather than the gorges: a fruit tree that someone left standing, and next to it a hole through which water disappears underground.

Salmovy lípy are a reminder of the noble family that shaped the Moravian Karst. The Salms owned the Blansko estate, and their name lives on in the Salmova stezka, the path between Macocha and the Punkva Caves.

Vavřinecká lípa stands close to Vavřinec, the village within whose boundaries lies the entrance to the Punkva Caves (Punkevní jeskyně) and the Podvrší u Veselice lookout tower.

Vilémovské lípy are seven large-leaved limes in Vilémovice, the village in whose boundaries the Macocha Abyss itself lies.

FAQ

What does it mean for a tree to be protected? It has been designated under the Nature and Landscape Protection Act. It is forbidden to damage or destroy it, or to interfere with its natural development, and that includes its root system. Every such tree must be marked in the field with the state emblem; here the marking is supplemented with an information board.

Who looks after them? Treatment is provided by AOPK ČR (the Nature Conservation Agency of the Czech Republic) or, where applicable, by major landowners; for the Jedovnická alej it was the Jihomoravský kraj Road Administration and Maintenance. Around 70 thousand crowns a year is spent on this (roughly €2,800 — a rough guide only, as the exchange rate changes), for 20 trees and 2 avenues.

How do I find them? Most have coordinates in the Ústřední seznam ochrany přírody (the Central Nature Conservation Register), which is public. Avenues and trees in villages are easy to find, while those in woodland (the three-trunked larch, Habrůvecký smrk, the beech in Babický les) are harder, so it pays to have a map on your phone.

Why are some left untreated? Because they stand in dense forest where they threaten nobody. There, the CHKO administration prefers to negotiate with landowners about thinning the surrounding stand, so that neighbouring trees stop shading the tree, its crown stops drying out and it can stand out.

Source: AOPK ČR, Rozbory předmětu ochrany CHKO Moravský kras (August 2017), chapter 3.5 and table no. 3. Dimensions and condition assessments correspond to the year 2017.

Spotted a mistake or an out-of-date detail? Tell us.