North America’s ancient bald cypress forests have told scientists about history’s legendary droughts and wet periods. Now they’re warning us about the future.
David Stahle stands atop a ladder leaning against a bald cypress tree as wide as he is tall. Like a woodsy Doctor Who dropped into this southern swamp with a sonic screwdriver, Stahle begins slowly boring through time.
is an overlooked patch along North Carolina’s Black River that contains the oldest known trees east of the Rockies. In fact, the bald cypress is the fifth oldest known sexually reproducing tree species on the planet. The tree Stahle has just cored is barely middle-age. One cypress he discovered here in 2017 dates to at least 605 B.C., not long after Homer regaled the Greeks with the adventures of Odysseus.
Cape Fear’s ghost forests, which can be seen from area bridges, are a microcosm of a much larger trend. A recent study by researchers at the University of Virginia and Duke University using satellite imagery found that the Gulf Coast and Atlantic coastal plain lost more than 5,000 square miles, or 8 percent, of forested coastal wetlands between 1996 and 2016. That’s a Connecticut-size swath of forest that is now mostly salt marsh and scrub.
The bald cypress is the fifth oldest known sexually reproducing tree species on Earth. This specimen on the Black River is not the tallest or prettiest, but it dates to at least 605 B.C. Stahle believes that even older trees exist along the quiet blackwater stream, making it worthy of federal protection. Please be respectful of copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited.
Many of those adaptations could prove invaluable to humans in a hotter, drier, and stormier world. One study found that even young cypress trees can withstand months of flooding more than 30 feet deep, while their trunks, their knees, and the swampy soils around their roots absorb stormwater and carbon like a sponge. Stahle has shown they can survive decades-long droughts, and others have determined that cypresses can contribute to groundwater recharge and even filter some contaminants.
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