Drago Milenario is a tree in the family of trees called Dragon. Even though it’s over a thousand years old, it doesn’t look like it will fall. On the other hand, some botanists think the tree is between 300 and 400 years old.
The Spanish phrase Drago Milenario roughly means a dragon tree that is a thousand years old. It is the largest and oldest dragon tree that is still alive on the Canary Islands. It is also the most well-known dragon tree in the world.
The Drago Milenario is in Icod de Los Vinos, a town in the Canary Islands that is part of Spain (Tenerife)
Table of Contents
The Dragon Trees in Brief
From a single stem, more dragon trees grow. When the tree is 10 to 15 years old, branches start to grow from it. After 10 more years, more branches grow. Older branches end where the new ones start to grow.
Dragon trees have a unique crown that can only be found on them because of how their branches grow. People like dragon trees in the Canary Islands and Morocco. The trees produce sap that contains some unique compounds. People have heard that sap can treat many diseases, including leukemia.
Description of Drago Milenario’s Body
The tree is 16.4 meters tall and 17.4 meters around and has about 300 main branches when the Drago Milenario flowers, about 1800 flowers bloom. This adds at most 3.5 tons to the weight of the tree. In the 1930s, concrete was added to the tree’s base to strengthen it.
The concrete helps keep the tree from falling by making it more stable. The concrete blends in well with the tree trunk. If you don’t look closely, you might not even notice it. The tree’s trunk now has a door on it.
The door lets you get into a hole cut 6 meters into the tree’s trunk. A fan is built into the hole. The fan makes it easier for air to move through the tree trunk.
How the Drago Milenario came to be
The tree was named a National Monument in 1917. Experts and people who live near it still don’t know how old it is. In the 1800s, the tree stood in the middle of a street and between two buildings. Some of the buildings were torn down so that people could get in.
In 1985, a fan was put in the tree’s trunk to help move the air around. In 1993, the street closest to the tree was moved, and a park was built around it. The park is about 3 hectares in size. The park was already set up by 1996.
Before the Drago Milenario, there was an older Dragon tree near Orotava on the island of Tenerife. In 1868, a storm blew down the 21-meter-tall tree.
Visiting Drago Milenario
After the park was set up, native Canary Island trees were planted there. Many people visit the park to see these trees and the Drago milenario. But the Drago Milenario is still the main reason people come to the park and the city of Icod.
Before tourists can enter the park, they must pay an entrance fee. The park is always full of tourists because the area around it is so peaceful.