Here’s a trick question that you’re sure to get wrong.
Can you guess the forest type featured in the photo below:
a. Cypress tree,
b. Cabbage palm or
c. Slash pine?
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| Can you see the last cypress tree still standing? |
Answer:
Despite what your eyes may be telling you (i.e. b), the correct answer is a. — a forest of cypress trees. What probably fooled you is that none of the cypress trees are currently standing, or even alive. Frequent wildfires and a decades long drought has wiped them out (except for one — can you see it leaning to the right on the far left?).
These two photos give a closer look at the forest floor.
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| Fire resistant cabbage palm (standing) and the the cypress trees they replaced (lying on the ground). |
As bleak as this may seem, the good news is that help is near:
The Picayune Strand Restoration Project.
This particular patch of over-drained swamp could start seeing a rising water table in the coming year.
The rest of the 55,000 acres is scheduled for completion in 2018.
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| I see a cypress forest (in the future twenty years) |
Finally, the end of the fifty year drought is near!
