// BBC UK NEWS — CRONACA
'Bendy tree' named UK Tree of the Year
The 150-year-old wych elm on the central promenade in Newcastle, County Down, took more than 30% of the national public vote in the UK Tree of the Year 2026
Newcastle's 'Bendy Tree' has been crowned UK Tree of the Year 2026 - the first time a tree in Northern Ireland has won the national title since it was launched in 2014.
The 150-year-old wych elm on the central promenade took more than 30% of the national public vote.
The theme of the Woodland Trust's annual competition was Against All Odds, with trees across the UK shortlisted for being impressive, beautiful and sometimes baffling examples of how nature can survive adversity.
Northern Ireland director John Martin said he was rooting for the "whimsical" tree to win and said tens of thousands across the UK had clearly felt the same.
"It's a great testament to the resilience of nature."
The Bendy Tree in County Down saw off competition from a small yew that has been growing from the masonry of a Devon church tower for 200 years, a Scottish ash that survived a lightning strike, and a Surrey yew, in which early 19th Century villagers found an embedded English Civil War cannonball.
The wych elm is the last remaining tree of a row that was planted along the original promenade in the 19th century, to shelter it from the sea breeze.
The rest of the trees were felled in the 1980s during redevelopment.
The wind it protected people from has made its trunk grow almost horizontal.