Dallas Morning News – June 7, 2018
CYPRESS TREES
Forty years ago I discovered an unusual tree growing in the Lakewood area. It appeared to be a bald cypress but the overall form was a thinner and the foliage was quite different. After some research, I discovered that it was a species of bald cypress called pond cypress (
Taxodium ascendens
) – common in Florida but not easily found here in Texas. It took a while but I found and bought a bunch of seedlings and planted them in a nursery south of Dallas. After they had grown for about 10 years, I designed these trees into a landscape project on Central expressway in Dallas. These trees have adapted and grown well, but you might notice that the ones on the left are much better looking. That’s because some of the trees on the right were replaced due to widening of Central Expressway and damage to several trees. The new trees haven’t fared as well as the original ones.
The lesson from this project is that pond cypress can be a good tree choice for north Texas but it is a buyer beware situation. The original trees planted before the widening of Central Expressway have beautiful foliage that spirals around the twigs and the leaflets do not open at all. They instead remain as neat filaments than create a soft, delicate look. Other trees sold as pond cypress through the years have foliage that partially opens the leaflets and some of these trees don’t seem to like our soils and thus become chlorotic and turn yellow. The same thing can happen with regular bald cypress. The key is where the trees were grown. Those grown in low pH (acid) soils will often grow poorly here in our alkaline soils. When the nursery or growing area is alkaline to neutral, the trees will grow beautifully here as you can see on Central.
There are several cypress (or cypress-like) trees that grow well here in north Texas – but some are more fool proof than others. Montezuma cypress is a faster growing, knee-less and often-superior tree to bald cypress. Italian cypress is a completely different, dramatic and sometimes problematic tree. Arizona cypress is also evergreen and unrelated to bald cypress but valuable when used in the right place.
Dawn redwood is another completely different genus but remarkably similar to bald cypress and rarely has any problems here in north Texas. Leyland cypress is a pretty plant but has has too many built-in problems. The main one is that it is subject to disease issues. Cypress trees do well here – but do your homework. My website should give you the info you need.