The Major Oak, 1,200 year old tree of Robin Hood fame, is dead in Sherwood Forest

I remember it like it was yesterday, that rainy summer day when I met the Major.

After traveling to Newstead Abbey, the ancestral home of Lord Byron, I caught a bus to Sherwood Forest.

The morning sky, plastered with dark-gray clouds, made the greenery of the forest so much brighter. After a few moments on the trail I started to see them, one after another — kings of the forest with bulging dark-brown trunks and curved branches growing in all directions — whispering to me through the leaves in the wind.

Then I came across a large clearing and there he stood, a giants among giants, no other tree around close in height or width - the Major Oak.

My eyes darted back and forth, trying to grasp the imposing silhouette in its entirety. And for a moment I stood there thinking about everything the tree has witnessed, how the land and people around it had transformed throughout its life. Trying to imagine Robin Hood and his companions sitting around it, perhaps celebrating another successful raid with song and a shared meal.

There was a German tour group admiring the scene, their guide explaining the arduous task of preserving this fragile tree, how hotter summers just like the one we were experiencing at the time made it that much harder. And as I gazed at the Major again, with many of its branches resting on supports, I saw the weight of centuries upon it.

The dark clouds moved in closer, prompting my departure. And just as I stepped deeper into the forest, once again feeling like the only person there, it happened: rain began pouring with all its strength, nature's full power surrounding me. With water running down my face, the smell of oak leaves in my nose, and the thrumming rain in my ears, I started to run.

Looking back on my visit with the Major, I had been gifted a fleeting feeling: I was transported centuries back in time and found myself at one with the wilderness, with no one around but the trees.

Twelve-hundred years passed in the shade of the Major Oak of Sherwood Forest before it was declared dead after failing to come to leaf. The storied tree is treasured not only for its age, stature and beauty, but for connections to the legend of Robin Hood, said to have hidden along with his band of outlaws inside the trunk to escape the Sheriff of Nottingham.

 Today, the once sprawling forest is confined to a 1,000 acre reserve.

The tree was not appreciated only by human admirers, it provided food and shelter for countless generations of hundreds of insect, fungi, bird and mammal species in an impressive display of concentrated biodiversity.

Sadly, it was people, well-intentioned or not, who contributed to the tree’s death. A combination of poor soil, human interventions and a weakened root system has been a major factor in the decline of the Major Oak, according to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. Climate change and associated recent heat waves and droughts compounded the challenges faced by the tree, wrote the society.

The Major Oak is not the oldest, nor the largest tree on Earth, but it will be remembered among a treasured few. Here are some other impressive ancients:

• Species: Pedunculate Oak (Quercus Robur)
• Canopy spread: 92 feet
• Trunk circumference: 36 feet
• Height: 52 feet
• Age: up to 1,200 years 

While it's not one of the oldest, it's one of the most well-known trees in the world. General Sherman is located in Sequoia National Park and about 2,200 years old. It's famed as the largest tree in the world by volume and weighs about 2.8 million pounds - as much as 15 adult blue whales. 

• Species: Giant Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum)
• Height: 275 ft.
• Girth: 103 ft.
• Location: Sequoia National Park, California
• Age: ~2,200 years

California boasts both the largest and oldest trees in the world. Methuselah, a bristlecone pine, is crowned as the oldest living non-clonal tree in the world with an estimated age of 4,850 years. It's been able to survive for so long because of its slow growth in cold, dry and high altitude conditions. The slow growth allows it to create incredibly dense wood that is nearly immune to rot, fungi and pests.

• Species: Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva)
• Height: 32 ft.
• Girth: 3 ft.
• Location: Inyo National Forest, California
• Age: ~4,850 years old

Based on recent scientific research, Methuselah may have competition for being the oldest tree in the world. Alerce Milenario, also known as Gran Abuelo, is a Patagonian cypress in Chile that could be anywhere from 2,400 to 5,500 years old. It's difficult to age because of its extremely wide trunk that could be rotted or decayed in the center, so scientists haven't been able to drill to the center to get an accurate tree-ring count.

• Species: Patagonian cypress (Fitzroya cupressoides)
• Height: 196 ft. 
• Girth: 14 ft.
• Location: Alerce Costero National Park, Chile
• Age: 2,400 to 5,500 years old

Situated in a churchyard in Scotland could be Europe's oldest living tree - The Fortingall Yew. Multiple trees of the yew species are vying for the rank of oldest, but scientists have trouble dating them because the trees split into several different hollowed-out trunks that make one tree appear to be several different trees.

• Species: European Yew (Taxus baccata)
• Height: 23 ft.
• Girth: 56 ft. (as of 1771)
• Location: Fortingall, Perthshire, Scotland
• Age: 2,000 to 5,000 years old

“Whilst the tree’s failure to produce leaves this year is heart-breaking for everyone – from the many people over the years who have looked after this magnificent tree to the millions who have travelled here to see it – we know the Major Oak will have a lasting legacy, first and foremost because it is so inextricably linked to Robin Hood and Sherwood Forest," wrote Hollie Drake, Senior Site Manager at RSPB Sherwood Forest.

"But beyond its cultural heritage, the Major Oak will continue to provide important habitat for wildlife, reminding us why these remarkable trees are so important and why protecting them for the future matters."

Please visit the website for The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds to learn more.