Easter comes but once a year -- but one couple have turned it into a lifetime's project. German pensioners Volker and Christa Kraft have decorated the tree in their back garden in Saalfeld for Easter for more than 40 years.
The tree sported just 18 eggs when he first started decorating it in 1965, but the numbers kept going up year by year as the tree grew.
And this year, the number is a whooping 10,000!
In recent years, the tree has become a tourist attraction that draws thousands of visitors in the weeks before Easter.
Kraft stands next to an apple tree decorated with approximately 10,000 Easter eggs in Saalfeld, Germany. All photographs: Jens Schlueter/Getty Images
Visitors look at an apple tree decorated with approximately 10,000 Easter eggs on the property of pensioner Volker in Saalfeld, Germany.
An Easter (bunny) egg hangs on the apple tree.
A woman makes a picture of the decorated apple tree.
Some visitors bring their own eggs and donate them to the tree, and eggs from foreign countries are represented. Especially precious eggs are shown in a protective display case.
These days, Kraft keeps an eye on the tree, welcomes visitors and patiently repeats answers to the questions he has been asked many times – how many eggs are there, how long did it take to do this, why he does this etc.
The tree in Saalfeld does not hold the record for the most eggs on one tree. That honor belongs to the Rostock Zoo, which in April 2007 decorated a red oak with 79,596 blown and painted eggs, which earned it an entry in Guinness World Records.
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