Off-script | NCPA

Today is Arbor Day in Poland, a country whose surface area is nearly 40 percent forest and the home to the last remaining primaeval forest, which once covered the entirety of the European Plain. Beech, birch, three varieties of oak, Norway spruce, and English yew trees are native to the country of 37 million people, but it’s the Scots Pine that covers nearly three-quarters of Poland’s forests. Its bark is thick and flaky, and a mature example has a long, bare, straight trunk (perfect for harvesting) topped by a flat mass of foliage.