A handbook on pruning and management of centuries-old olive trees as a tool of safeguard.

Safeguard, conservation and evaluation of olive trees should be programmed with a preliminary discrimination of plants having characteristics of monumental trees and normal trees. In the second case the policy is most oriented to preserve the yield potential of trees, while in the case of monumental olive trees many evaluations (plant age, size, esthetic value, landscape situation, historical relevance, and cultural identity heritage) contribute to regulate the objective of the tree conservation. In Sardinia Island there are many possibilities to observe single trees or wild populations or orchards of oleaster or olive very old and having the characteristics of monumental plants. This is the typical situation that is easily found in the landscape of the Genuri Municipality. Agriculture Department of the University of Sassari, Sardinia regional Agencies AGRIS and LAORE, and the Municipality of Genuri (Italy) jointly worked to produce a “Handbook on pruning and management of centuries-old olive trees” as tool of a wide program of safeguard of a total of about 900 trees growing in the land. Pruning techniques are presented with a clear and essential language and with many images, inviting growers to be responsible of the survival of their old-trees. In particular, many information was provided on the possibility to maintain a correct equilibrium between plant monumental characteristics and yield possibilities, the adequate use of equipments, the labor security essentials, and the plant pathologies generated by wrong pruning.