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  Bald-cypress, Taxodium distichum, is the quintessential tree of southern swamps where it is characteristically covered with Spanish moss, Tillandsia usneoides (L.) L., which is actually in the bromeliad family the same as pineapple, Ananas comosus (L.) Merr.  A unique feature of bald-cypress is cypress knees, which grow only on trees in wetlands and are apparently an adaptation to allow the roots to get the oxygen necessary for respiration in the normally anaerobic environment of saturated soils that is evident from a swamp gas odor.  The name bald-cypress is because it is deciduous, where determinate stems are actually lost rather than just leaves, despite being a conifer.  Pond cypress, T. ascendens, is a similar species that is sometimes only considered to be a variety where a notable difference is the leaves being appressed to the stem rather than resembling a feather. 

   The Alabama state champion bald-cypress is 112 feet tall, has a girth of 326 inches (the third largest in Alabama closely following a southern red oak Quercus falcata Michx., that may be a misidentified pagoda oak, Q. pagoda Raf., and is a distant second to a live oak, Q. virginiana Mill.), and an average limb spread of 56 feet.  The Alabama state champion pond-cypress 64 feet tall, 53 inches in circumference, and has an average limb spread of 29 feet, but the one I saw during a dendrology class was larger unfurtunately I don't recall how to get to where it is much less if it is even still there considering how frequently state champions turnover.

   I’ve heard stories of thousands of bald cypress seedling being planted in Lake Guntersville, but it appears that most of those that survived were actually planted at the homes of the TVA employees.  This is because of a misconception that they must be planted in standing water.  I have even seen where a forest manager planted several that were 3-4 feet tall with only their tips above water.  The form is pyramidal in youth, but eventually the top becomes flattened and if in a wetland the trunk becomes buttressed with surrounding cypress knees extending up to just over the normal depth of saturation.  The wood is very rot resistant, therefore, it is used to construct boat docks and other structures where wood it exposed to the elements.

  Cypress is mentioned in the Bible, but this refers to Cupressus sempervirens, which is in a different family than bald-cypress.  The gopher wood used by Noah is also believed to be cypress, but gopher wood can also be translated as square beams.