It looks like a dome. The tree tops rise above the vast grasslands like a hill on the open prairie.  But guess what, it is really a depression/solution hole in the limestone.  The hole retains water and trees grow larger and faster in the wettest locations.  Further from the center is slightly drier and trees slightly shorter.  Further out…more dry..shorter trees.  The result?  A shape that looks like a rise or a dome on the horizon.  Cool huh?

Even cooler, we hiked into the center of the cypress dome.

They call it a slough slog. First steps are through the drier soil blanketed with sawgrass and scattered bald cypress.  Shoes get a bit muddy but nothing too severe.  We trek on and encounter mud to our shoe tops and occasional puddles.  A bit further and we reach the first pond cypress and step into standing water.  The pooled water is glass clear.  Fish dart.  Tapered trunks of the cypress are perfectly reflected in the mirror-like surface.  The air is still and quiet.   We walk on carefully placing footsteps in water sometimes nearly knee deep.  In some areas the water is strewn with snail shells.  Near the center of the dome we find the deepest pool…no we didn’t actually walk through to see how deep.   Gar break the surface setting concentric ripples into motion.  Warblers dart about in the tree tops.  We move on.  Air plants drape the cypress.  It is amazing how subtle differences in water level and humidity make big differences in plant life.  What a tangled web life weaves.   We step back out into the everyday world.