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Please bear with me until finishing the story of our old Sakura. The Endos, we call Endo-Dosei is a group sharing same family name Endo. There is very old Sakura (cherry) tree in the grave yard of Endos. We can see this Sakura picture in the book, Shinano-no-Ippon-Sakura (Ref.1).
This book introduced our Sakura as 400 years old and the variety is Edohigan-sakura, while another book, Yashiro (Ref.2) wrote it as var. Somei-yoshino-sakura. I am interested in these writings, which is correct? Here I verify the fact based on evidences.
The first trial is about the age of the tree. I called Omachi city office because the book (Ref. 1) said that the estimate of the age was due to Omachi city office. The answer of the office is such that there is no person who remember the event, however they kindly asked about it to Omachi Mountain musium where many biological specialists work.
According to them, the role of estimation is based on the maximum length of stem-surroundings; the border to separate more than 400 years or less is due to the length as 5m or less. Actually, our old Sakura has maximum surroundings more than 5m. Therefore, they judged it as the age about 400 years old (answer obtained at 2019 March).
The second examination is about the variety name. So far reference studied, there is no report that Somei-yoshino-sakura lives more than 100 years. The next step is the test of botanical feature. A study on the botanical dictionary showed that Edohigan-sakura has the following characteristics: the shape of leaf is oval with 5 to 10 cm length, the leaf has saw-tooth, the timing of flowering is earlier than Somei-yoshino-sakura, flowering comes ahead of the leaf spread, the color of flower is white, the petal number is five with single layer, the calyx is ballooned at the bottom, and the gland of nectary attached at 5 mm above the leaf base (usually hard to observe).
Based on these descriptions, I examined the flower and the nectary (Pict.1,2) together with field observation. As you see on the pictures, a bit ballooned calyx and the position of the glant are not in contradiction with dictionary discription. Based on these observations, I concluded that our old tree is variety Edo-higan-sakura.
Regarding the estimate of tree age, I tried to find another evidence that shows 400 years old. We have some memorial tablets showing the year of death. One of the oldest memorial tablets tells us the year of death as Genna 8 (1622). This year is in the early Edo era, and close to 400 years old. This person is probably one of the oldest ancestors of Endo-families.
There is no contradiction between the estimation based on the stem size and the record of memorial tablet. It was most likely that a young cherry tree was planted beside the oldest tombstone, then grew with the history of Endo-families toward the age of about 400 years.
In the Omachi town, there is an another old Edohigan-sakura estimated as 300 years old. The city office designated it as a cultural property. I claimed why our Sakura is not designated as another cultural property, because the age of ours is older. According to the city office, they are not able to designate ours as cultural property due to its private ownership. The office, however, kindly suggested us to take care as long as time lasts regardless of its cultural property.
Refference
Ref1: Edohigan-sakura at Miyamoto"Shinano-no-Ippon-Sakura"ShinanoMainichi Newspaper, 2012.March 2,
auther Shigeru Oonuki (Japanese with many picture)
Ref2: Yshiro Edited by The comittee of Yashiro-shi-Henshu
Shinano Shoseki Printing corp. 1975.February 1 ( first edition, not on sale)(Japanese)
Ref3: https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A8%E3%83%89%E3%83%92%E3%82%AC%E3%83%B3
Ref:4 http://elm3.web.fc2.com/top/ha-no-kaisetu/edohigan.html
Ref5: https://ameblo.jp/kawasemi2030/entry-12016660086.html
In 2019, Japanese Endo families have a nice meeting with American Endow family (Pict.3). American Endow is the family of immigrant III and IV. They are our sibling who have crossed Pacific Ocean a long time ago. How they reached us is a miracle, but there is a story such that they requested to find their family's root upon their travel. A kind person of travel agency responded their request. After a hard work, he finally finds an old Sakura tree that might be a pilot toward their origin. Endow's expectation becomes true, and the old Sakura tree is exactly the Edohigan-sakura, which grow in our graveyard. It was quite lucky that an old sibling name was present on the tombstone. The matching of their memory and ancestral name on the tombstone is really great miracle. Thus, American Endow found their origin of Japanese Endo. A bridge over the ocean is now ongoing (Endo families).
