Apalachicola Reserve, Florida

Flora (Plant Life)

More than 1,500 plant species have been identified within the Apalachicola drainage basin with 107 of them listed as threatened or endangered. Also, the largest stand of tupelo trees in the world is found in the lower Apalachicola River flood plain. A variety of vegetative communities, such as coastal scrub, dunes, pine flatwoods, oak hammocks, marshes, ponds and sloughs are found on the reserve's islands. Vegetation in the salt marshes is made up primarily of black needlerush, smooth cordgrass and saltgrass. Freshwater ponds and marshes are dominated by sawgrass and cattail.

Primary forest types found within the reserve are pine (slash, sand and loblolly); pine and mixed hardwoods (sweetgum, sugarberry, water oak, loblolly pine); mixed hardwoods (water hickory, sweetgum, overcup oak, green ash, and sugarberry); tupelo-cypress with mixed hardwoods (water tupelo, ogeechee tupelo, bald cypress, swamp tupelo, Carolina ash, planer tree); tupelo-cypress (water tupelo, bald cypress, ogeechee tupelo, swamp tupelo); and pioneer (black willow, swamp cottonwood).

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