Olea europaea - wild type

Olive trees were domesticated and planted by people, and passed natural genetic selection - people preferred the bigger trees, with more fruit that had higher oil content.
since they were planted all over the Mediterranean, they pollinated the wild type and today - most of the olive trees around the world are either domesticated, or hybrid of wild and domesticated. there are very few places where the wild type is kept clean. near the shores of Atlit in Israel, a research was done and it is proved that these are wild-type olives. since they grow very close to the sea, and the wind usually comes from the sea into the land - Olive trees are wind-pollinated - they were not pollinated by planted olives.
This makes these Olive trees genetically important: they have the genes diversity, from them we can find genes that will be able to live through the climate changes, resist diseases and help us preserve olive trees in the future.