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THE GARDEN OF VENAFRO'S MONUMENTAL OLIVE TREES

The garden of Venafro’s monumental olive trees is a one of a kind and has been realised by the association “Associazione Patriarchi della Natura in Italia” (Association of Nature Patriarchs in Italy) upon a request made by the Regional Park Olive of Venafro, which is located in Molise, on the slopes of the Mainarde mountain chain.

This is a real genetic bank where you can find the “twins” of the most ancient and significant olive trees in Italy. The main objective is to preserve over time the gene pool of these monumental trees whose extraordinary DNA was able to resist to climatic and parasitic adverse conditions over hundreds and thousands of years. For these reasons, these are the trees of the future and the most suitable in order to fight environmental stress.

The garden is located inside a monumental olive grove in the Regional Park Olive of Venafro, in Molise, on the slopes of the Mainarde mountain chain. In addition to thousand-year old olive trees, here you can find Roman artifacts such as cyclopean walls, ancient cisterns and the remains of a Roman villa.

This project has provided for the planting of twenty small olive trees with a great genetic value, which were reproduced by the Association of Nature Patriarchs. The olive grove they were planted in includes thousand-year old olive trees which, according to the Roman poet Orazio, produced the best olive oil in the Mediterranean area back in Roman times. Each olive tree is equipped with a panel which illustrates pictures and information about the mother plant and the variety. In addition to that, a larger and more general panel explains the project and its objectives, which are the preservation of the genetics and the memory about these young monumental trees.

The project was realised in 2013 and inaugurated in 2014 with a conference entitled “Italian monumental trees, forgotten fruits and biodiversity” attended by numerous Italian experts along with the president of the Regional Park Olive of Venafro.