The Dorsland tree, also known as the Dorsland Baobab and the Dorsland Grootboom ( af, Large Thirstland Tree), is a

baobab ''Adansonia'' is a genus made up of eight species of medium-to-large deciduous trees known as baobabs ( or ). They are placed in the Malvaceae family, subfamily Bombacoideae. They are native to Madagascar, mainland Africa, and Australia.Tropic ...

tree in

Namibia Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...

which is found to the south of the

Khaudum National Park Khaudum National Park is an isolated Nature Reserve situated in the Kalahari Desert at the west of the Caprivi Strip in northeast of Namibia. It is a very remote and inaccessible reserve but is home to some magnificent animals, such as the lion an ...

. At around 2,100 years old, it is believed to be the oldest tree in the country. It is high, has a circumference of more than and keeps growing despite having fallen over. In 2006, two of its oldest relatives died. The previous oldest tree in the country, known as ''Grootboom'', was high, but died in 2005. The tree was where the Dorsland trekkers camped in 1883 and they carved the year of the visit, "1883", into the tree. In 1891 a detachment of German troops passed the tree and carved "1891" and the name of three in the group "H. Gathemann", "E. Heller" and "D. Hannemann" into the tree.

References

Individual baobab trees {{tree-stub