Marton Oak
Cheshire
Recorded by: Not specified, The Woodland Trust
-
Heritage Tree
-
Trees of National Special Interest (TNSI)
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Champion Tree – UK’s Fattest
The Marton Oak stands in a private garden in Marton, Cheshire, on the aptly named 'Oak Lane' - suggesting the tree must have been a local landmark for many centuries. This is a sessile oak and is very fragmented, making an accurate girth measurement impossible. The centre is totally hollow, with just a few large fragments of the outer bole remaining, leaning outward under their own weight. This tree may be in the latter stages of its immense lifespan, but it will have provided a continuous supply of valuable deadwood over the past centuries, supporting the local ecology. Although not possible to tell from the fragments remaining, it is thought this tree may have been pollarded in its past. If so, it will also have provided local people with essential firewood, construction materials and winter animal fodder to generations gone-by.
- Species:
- Pedunculate oakQuercus robur
- Form:
- Pollard
- Standing or fallen:
- Fragmented
- Living status:
- Alive
- Girth:
- 14.02m at a height of 1.50m
- Veteran status:
- Ancient tree
- County:
- Cheshire
- Country:
- England
- Grid reference:
- SJ8522068315
- Public accessibility:
- Private - not visible from public access (permission required to view)
- Surroundings:
- Domestic garden
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Marton Oak
Cheshire
Recorded by: Not specified, The Woodland Trust
- Species:
- Pedunculate oak
- Form:
- Pollard
- Standing or fallen:
- Fragmented
- Living status:
- Alive
- Girth:
- 14.02m at a height of 1.50m
- Condition:
- Holes or water pockets, Hollowing trunk, Hollowing branches, Decaying wood in the crown, Decaying wood on the ground
- Veteran status:
- Ancient tree
- Tree number:
- 23583
- Local or historic name:
- Marton Oak
- Tag number:
- County:
- Cheshire
- Country:
- England
- Grid reference:
- SJ8522068315
- Public accessibility:
- Private - not visible from public access (permission required to view)
- Surroundings:
- Domestic garden
- Ancient tree site:
- --
- Woodland Trust wood:
- No
- Epiphytes:
- Lichen
- Fungi:
- --
- Invertebrates:
- Yes
- Bats:
- --
- Recorded by:
- Not specified
- Recording organisation:
- The Woodland Trust
- Last visited:
- 06/11/2018
- First recorded:
- 25/01/2008
Whilst visiting this tree in August 2025 to gather some acorns for my project Mighty Fine Oaks, I noticed that the many acorns on the tree, in this amazing mast year, were clearly pedunculate with quite long peduncles. Many of the leaves also had reasonably well-defined auricles basally, and although they had short petioles, these were not beyond the limits for Quercus robur mentioned by Stace in his oak key for the British Flora. This is rather a peculiar state of affairs, as the Marton Oak has clearly been identified as a Sessile Oak (Q. petraea) by many authors, researchers and organisations, presumably for over 200 years, but it does indeed appear to be Q. robur. I wonder how this can be? Aljos Farjon also had this tree down as Q. robur in his database from a visit in June 2016. So it seems the largest-girthed and probably oldest oak in Britain has been misidentified. This ATI page is showing this tree as Q. petraea as of 09 December 2025.