Created 24-Sep-20
Modified 16-Aug-23
A South Florida cypress swamp is a seasonally flooded forest dominated by cypress trees – conifers that prior to WWII reached over 100 feet tall in SW Florida. Their lightweight, rot resistant wood made them essential for the War’s PT boat industry so that few giant trees remain today. Hurricanes from the 1960s to the present day knocked down many of the remaining giants so it will be another hundred years or so before the current generation of trees may begin to scrape the skies again.
The dwarf cypress forests are stands of small cypress trees that live in potholes in the limestone rock – their height effectively limited by the lack of space for root development and nutrient uptake. The inverted soup bowl shape of a cypress dome is also due to soil depth. The center of the dome has deeper soil because the limestone bedrock has been dissolved away by thousands of years of organic acid action from decomposed plant material. Deep soil over a deep solution hole enables trees to be larger and usually means there is water in the center of the dome for more months than the surrounding dwarf forests or grassy prairies. This water supports fish, turtles, wading birds, and even alligators who may feed easily because the food is so concentrated as the dry season progresses. Cypress strands are elongated cypress swamps; the center usually has deep water that remains even in the driest of seasons. In the well-drained sandy soils of the western sections of the Big Cypress Swamp, dwarf cypress grades into slash pine flatwoods. Loxahatchee Slough between Lake Okeechobee and West Palm Beach contains remnants of cypress swamp.
Fortunately, it’s relatively easy to walk into the cypress forests on boardwalk trails. But the real fun for me has been the “swamp slog / swamp tromps” that I’ve done off trail. There’s nothing like wading waist deep cool water - slowly and silently walking with like-minded companions deep into the swamp. No trails, just compass directions and landmarks to guide you. Because the cypress, red maples, pop ash, and pond apples that make up most of the forest canopy are deciduous, and water levels of the swamp vary dramatically from wet to dry season, I enjoy photographing the same location multiple times each year because of the differences in light and landscape. I’ve been lost only once (in the Fakahatchee Strand but we found our way back to the road almost a mile away from our vehicle as light was fading), and have learned to limit the distance of my forays in order to focus on the photographs rather than the area covered. I’ve only been close to alligators a couple of times but each time I knew where they were and adjusted my path accordingly so as not to be a threat to them.
Photographs in this Gallery were made from the air in a Cessna 172 piloted by Nick Hernandez-Hendrix; in the Big Cypress National Preserve: Dade-Collier Transition & Training Airport; Kirby Storter Roadside Park; along the Loop Road (Hwy 94) and at Sweetwater Strand, Gator Hook Strand, Pace’s Dike and Gum Slough; along the Turner River Road (Hwy 839) and at Bear Island Unit; in Collier Seminole State Park; in Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and the Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed (CREW) Marsh, Naples; in Dinner Island Ranch Wildlife Management Area, Clewiston; in Everglades National Park in the dwarf cypress forest between
Pahayokee and Mahogany Hammock roads, in “Double Dome”, and “Movie Dome”; in Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park, Copeland; in Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge, Immokalee; and on the East Coast in the Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge, Boynton Beach; Tall Cypress Natural Area, Coral Springs, and in Grassy Waters Preserve, West Palm Beach.
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All images © Christopher P. Migliaccio
