Baldcypress | XL Tree Seedling

About Baldcypress

Baldcypress (Taxodium distichum) is a large deciduous conifer typically associated with the swamps, bayous, and waterways of the Southeastern United States and Gulf Coast. It is rare for a conifer to lose its needles as the Baldcypress does every autumn, and that remarkable quality is why this tree came to be called “bald.” Baldcypress is a member of the Redwood Family, and it grows ever more imposing and elegant with age, reaching heights over 130 feet, with immense, deeply fluted trunks and feathery seasonally-changing foliage lightly adorning powerful branches. In its native realms, the irregular crowns of Baldcypress trees are often richly draped with Spanish Moss. This tree’s closest relative is the unmistakably similar-looking Dawn Redwood (also deciduous, hailing from China).

Baldcypress is obviously a very water-tolerant species, often growing on chronically flooded alluvial plains or in bogs and swamps where large trees literally emerge out of the water. When growing in water, Baldcypresses can form highly unique buttress-like root growths off their lower trunks known as “cypress knees” — these growths very much resemble the “flying buttresses” famous in Gothic church architecture.

Baldcypress is a very long-lived species. The oldest known still-living specimen is estimated to be nearly 1,700 years old. The wood of Baldcypress has even greater longevity. Baldcypress wood has almost miraculous qualities for rot resistance and durability, for which it has earned the moniker, “Wood Eternal.” Still-usable prehistoric wood can be found in swamps to this day, some of it dating back more than 50 thousand years.

Though Baldcypress trees hail from mild climates and usually grow on very wet soils, these are not requirements. In cultivation, the Baldcypress thrives in a wide range of soil conditions and can tolerate climates that that dip well below zero (to -30°F or lower!). Hence, Baldcypress has become a very popular ornamental in diverse climates throughout the U.S., Southern Canada, Europe, and Asia.