Travellers in the South pass forests of dark pines, and along the edges
of swamps the pines often give way to solid stretches of trees with pale
grey trunks, and lettuce green foliage, whose lightness contrasts
strangely and beautifully with the solid bank of dark green that roofs
the forests of pines. A closer look at these strange trees, which often
stand knee-deep in water, is not so easy. At certain seasons of the year,
however, these swamps are dry enough so that one may walk dry-shod among
them, and so learn to know the bald cypress of the South, one of the most
beautiful and interesting of native American trees.
This is the second of the cone-bearing trees which is not an evergreen.
The leaves on the new shoots are two-ranked, soft and pale sage green in
colour. The stems that bear these plumy leaves bear also scattered single
blades. Among them are older twigs, tipped with cones, and bearing
branchlets with scale-like leaves scarcely spreading at the tips. These
are much smaller than the leaves arranged in two ranks, forming
feather-like, leafy branchlets. It is these which are shed, branchlets,
and all, in the autumn, and fresh in spring renew the feathery grace of
the long, narrow tree top.
The most surprising thing about the bald cypress is the flaring base of
the trunk, and the root system which seems too large for the tall but
usually narrow top. Knees of cypress rising out of the water from the
main roots, are distinguished from stumps by their smooth, conical tops.
The base of a great tree often spreads into wide flying buttresses, each
hollowed on the inside, but serving with the others to support the
hollow-trunked tree. Many a giant of great age stands thus on stilts
whose submerged ends are the gnarled roots of the tree. From these rise
many smooth, knobbed knees above the surface of the water in the rainy
season. By some foresters, humps on the roots are supposed to be
necessary to the proper breathing of the roots, submerged under water so
large a part of the year. The question of what causes these growths, and
of what use they are, is not fully determined.
The cones of the bald cypress are globular, and about the size of an
olive. By them the tree declares its relationship to the needle-leaved
evergreens. The wood is light and easy to work, but not noticeably
resinous. It is used for buildings, and for special parts, such as doors,
shingles. It is beautiful when stained, and would be more valuable for
interior finish of houses did it not keep the record of each bump and
dent, as all soft woods do. Buckets and barrels to contain liquids are
largely made of this wood. In railroad ties it proves very durable.
The best and strangest fact about this tree is that though it belongs to
the South, and is a swamp tree by preference, it grows large and
beautiful in the North, and in soil that is only moderately moist. The
parks of Brooklyn have some noble specimens of this bald cypress of the
South. They stand, tall, handsome shafts, feathered lightly with their
short, drooping side branches, clothed with pale green leaves. There is
no peculiarity of spreading trunk or knees to disturb the sod that comes
up around the base of the tree. In the autumn the foliage turns yellow,
and drops with the larch leaves. Through the winter the globular cones
are present to prove this bald cypress a relative of the evergreens,
which are its neighbours.