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Corsican Pine
 

 

Corsican Pine, Pinus nigra subsp. laricio

1814

The large Corsican pine near the Main Gate was brought back from the South of France in 1814 by R. A. Salisbury, a botanist at Kew, and was planted a few years later. It now represents the site of the first Pinetum at Kew in the systematically laid out plantings following the Linnaean system. In the early 20th century, a light aircraft crashed into the upper crown of the tree taking out the top. Since then it has been struck by lightning on at least two occasions, the latest in 1992 with only the scars on the main trunk as a reminder.

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