FIELD ID CHARACTERISTICS:
Knees and buttressed trunks characteristic of cypress. Note flat-topped shape of older trees. Bark thin, rough, and not shredding.
Description: Medium to large deciduous tree with straight trunk, horizontal branches, and wide-spreading base. Crowns of young trees are conical, but become "flat-topped" with old age. To 40 m or more tall.
Leaves: Narrow linear leaves to 2 cm long, occurring in 1 plane and appearing feather-like on small alternate branches that are not upturned.
Flowers/Fruit: Female cones ball-shaped with brown scale-like markings. Male cones less conspicuous in drooping panicles. Pollen released March/April; fruits in October.
Habit and Range: Blackwater and brownwater rivers, swamps, forested wetlands, edges of ponds, mainly in the Coastal Plain. Although it cannot germinate in water, cypress will thrive in open water once established. Non-natural occurrence in some counties (C value of 0).
Taxonomic Note: Many references consider the two cypresses to be varieties of the same species, Taxodium distichum, with visual differences attributed to environmental factors.
COMMON CONFUSIONS:
Taxodium ascendens (pond cypress) needles are smaller, shorter, and appressed on upturned branchlets; however, needles on young trees and new shoots of T. ascendens appear more like those of T. distichum (bald cypress). Needles are much thinner in T. distichum but superficially similar to Tsuga canadensis (eastern hemlock), which is found in the Mountains but never in the Coastal Plain.
Click here to view Taxodium ascendens.
Link to side-by-side comparisons page
