How about Swamps and Sloughs

[Keith]

I was out for a walk, or maybe slog in my hip waders this morning, studying Bald Cypress knees and loop roots. I didn’t even know the name loop roots until recently, although I’ve been seeing them for years, thinking they were just weird knees.
I couldn’t imagine why a tree would send roots up from underground into the air, then back down. It turns out, the roots grow into rotting stumps, which finally vanish, leaving the roots standing in its place.

 

[Keith]

There was a bit of pollen out trying to make art on the water, and probably has something to do with feeling a need to cough.


And here are a couple of my ancient trees I like to visit.

That open water was about waist deep, so lots of those knees were taller than me at 6’.

 

[Cliff Hilbert]

There was a bit of pollen out trying to make art on the water, and probably has something to do with feeling a need to cough.
View attachment 150864

And here are a couple of my ancient trees I like to visit.
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That open water was about waist deep, so lots of those knees were taller than me at 6’.

The crappie should be shallow in the trees soon if they aren't already.

 

[Keith]

There are cypress knees, and then there are LOOP ROOTS, can you pick this one out from is neighbors?


From the other side.

 

[Keith]

I can’t seem to pass this place without capturing a little light to take along with me. This is the longes finger of five unnamed sloughs branching off of an old oxbow lake. Almost all of the Bald cypress trees of a certain size has a band of gray lichens growing on their north sides above the highest flood line, causing that lightest band above the darkest band, which are the buttresses.
Last week when I showed the pollen floating on the water, there was a south breeze moving it to he north shore, which deposited a 3” band around the knees, as the water dropped about 10” over the week.



Back in 1981, George Nakashima wrote the book, “The Soul of a Tree”, which inferred that his furniture, being the remains of a former tree, could be thought of as its soul. Being a young artisan woodworker myself, it made an influence on my thinking and work.

In nature, when a tree dies naturally, its neighbors, and likely offspring can’t utilize its stored carbon and other nutrients without the aid of fungus or rot. The fungus eats the wood breaking it down producing nitrogen, phosphorus and enzymes that the living trees can utilize, so the surrounding trees send their roots up into this rotting wood to absorb it, rather than allowing it to just be washed away with the next rain.
To my thinking, these loop root formations are mother nature’s way so revealing ‘The Soul of a former Tree’ on the very spot where it grew.

After all of the former tree has decayed and gone, these roots are left standing, growing and functioning as knees, by gaining oxygen, and maybe expelling some water absorbed through the inner bark, diluting the photosynthate / sap. It then flows on out to grow more root cells.

 

[Cliff Hilbert]

I can’t seem to pass this place without capturing a little light to take along with me. This is the longes finger of five unnamed sloughs branching off of an old oxbow lake. Almost all of the Bald cypress trees of a certain size has a band of gray lichens growing on their north sides above the highest flood line, causing that lightest band above the darkest band, which are the buttresses.
Last week when I showed the pollen floating on the water, there was a south breeze moving it to he north shore, which deposited a 3” band around the knees, as the water dropped about 10” over the week.

View attachment 152017

Back in 1981, George Nakashima wrote the book, “The Soul of a Tree”, which inferred that his furniture, being the remains of a former tree, could be thought of as its soul. Being a young artisan woodworker myself, it made an influence on my thinking and work.

In nature, when a tree dies naturally, its neighbors, and likely offspring can’t utilize its stored carbon and other nutrients without the aid of fungus or rot. The fungus eats the wood breaking it down producing nitrogen, phosphorus and enzymes that the living trees can utilize, so the surrounding trees send their roots up into this rotting wood to absorb it, rather than allowing it to just be washed away with the next rain.
To my thinking, these loop root formations are mother nature’s way so revealing ‘The Soul of a former Tree’ on the very spot where it grew.

After all of the former tree has decayed and gone, these roots are left standing, growing and functioning as knees, by gaining oxygen, and maybe expelling some water absorbed through the inner bark, diluting the photosynthate / sap. It then flows on out to grow more root cells.

View attachment 152018

Wow, those are great shots, Keith!!

 

[PietZA]

I agree with Cliff; these are amazing shots of an incredible subject.
In the first picture in post #4, I see a knight in chainmail and other people in cloaks standing around.