Spanish Moss

Member of Pineapple Family

Grows year round

This beautiful plant is a lacy, romantic symbol of the South. It grows in humid coastal areas in Southeastern United States. Mainly it is found in Louisianna, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, the Carolinas and Florida. It is also found in some areas of Texas. These pictures were taken in North East Texas on beautiful Caddo Lake.

If you click on first picture of the sunset and look in the center of the picture just at the water line, you will see that someone has put a dummie "Bigfoot" standing in the water ---scarey looking. Not such a funny thing if you happen to bump into it in the dark. From the shore it looked real.

Spanish Moss is neither a moss or a parasite; rather, it is a tropical, epiphytic herb which grows on another plant upon which it depends for support, but not for nutrients. An epiphytic , or air plant, has no roots. Having through evolution broken all connection from the earth, it is self-sustaining in its manufacture of food and absorption of nutrients from aerial roots. It just uses the trees as it support on which to grows.

It is a member of the Pineapple family, Bromeliaceae. It is also called "Greybeard" because it looks like an old man's beard. Click on picture to get a closer look. In summer it has tiny flowers that resemble those of a china berry tree. These pictures taken on Caddo Lake, the largest natural lake in Texas and the largest lake in the South. It covers about 26,800 acres at normal water level. It supports one of the largest cypress tree growth swamps anywhere.