does well in acid, neutral and alkaline soils across the full range of light (sandy), medium (loamy), and heavy (clay) soils. It can also grow in saline soils. It can tolerate atmospheric pollution. The cones are often consumed by wildlife. The tallest known specimen, near Williamsburg, Virginia, is 44.11 m (145 ft) tall, and the stoutest known, in the Real County near Leakey, Texas, has a circumference of 475 in (39 ft). The National Champion Bald Cypress is recognized as the largest member of its species in the country and is listed as such on the National Register of Champion Trees by American Forest. The National Champion Bald Cypress is in the Cat Island Nation Wildlife Refuge, near St. Francisville, Louisiana, and it is tall, in circumference, and is estimated to be approximately 1,500 years old. The oldest known living specimen, found along the Black River in North Carolina, is at least 2,624 years old, rendering it the oldest living tree in eastern North America. The Senator, a bald cypress near Sanford, Florida, was tall before the hurricane of 1925, when it lost about in height. It had a circumference of and a diameter of and estimated to be 3,500 years old. It was burned down accidentally by a drug addict in 2012. "Big Dan" is one of the oldest living specimens and is found near High Springs, Florida at Camp Kulaqua. It is estimated to be 2,704 years old as of 2020. It is growing in the Hornsby Spring swamp run and is more than 35 feet in circumference. Gallery Taxonomy The closely related Taxodium ascendens (pond cypress) is treated by some botanists as a distinct species, while others classify it as merely a variety of bald cypress, as Taxodium distichum var. imbricatum (Nutt.) Croom. It differs in shorter leaves borne on erect shoots, and in ecology, being largely confined to low-nutrient blackwater habitats. A few authors also treat Taxodium mucronatum as a variety of bald cypress, as T. distichum var. mexicanum Gordon, thereby considering the genus as comprising only one species. Habitat and distribution The native range extends from southeastern New Jersey south to Florida and west to Central Texas and southeastern Oklahoma, and also inland up the Mississippi River. Ancient bald cypress forests, with some trees more than 1,700 years old, once dominated swamps in the Southeast. The original range had been thought to only reach as