Taxodium distichum var. imbricarium

Pond cypress is in the cypress or Cupressaceae family and is native to the southeastern coastal plain of United States, from North Carolina to Louisiana. It occurs in deep, slow-moving channels of water flowing through forested swamps or wetlands. It prefers wet, poorly drained areas.

It is very similar to bald cypress and hybridizes with it as well. Pond cypress is generally narrower, smaller, leaves are more pressed against stems and more spirally arranged, grows on pond margins as opposed to in it.

• The synonym Taxodium ascendens also is still used to describe this species.
• Leaves are awl-like, narrow, growing in a connected series on long leaf stems [technically petioles] up to 30 cm long, extending vertically from the main central brown stems.
• The deciduous long stems of leaves are abscised (cut off) in the late fall, leaving the tree "bald" over the winter.
• Male flowers are yellow-green hanging catkins up to 20 cm long; females are green, in small clusters at the base of the male catkins.
• Seed cones are round, to 3 cm long, green and ripening to brown and separating into individual scales.
• It has cypress "knees" projecting above the water, possibly giving the roots access to more oxygen in very wet soil or often beneath water.