Greetings, readers. Today we learn about the spooky, haunted-house kind of plant called Spanish Moss as we continue our series, Caring for Mother Nature, by my friend, author and naturalist, Peggy Sias Lantz (click her name to visit her website).
Spanish Moss
by Peggy Lantz
When I was a child in the 1930s and ‘40s, returning to Florida and Lake Lucy on our vacations, my brother and I would peer out the car windows looking for the first signs of Spanish moss in the trees along the road. It meant we were a little closer to the most wonderful place in the world.
Spanish moss grows on trees, fences, telephone poles, barbed wire – anywhere it can find a place where it can grab hold. It’s rarely seen on pine trees or palm trees because the needles and fronds are too smooth and slippery. Spanish moss is not a parasite and does not harm the trees it hangs on, unless the moss gets so full that it smothers leaves or so heavy with rain that it breaks branches.
What is this strange moss?
It is neither Spanish nor a moss. It is an air plant, called an epiphyte. It gets nourishment from rain and the detritus that washes off the tree and floats in the air.
It has no roots, but it does have blossoms. They are tiny with three recurved green petals and a lovely aroma. Look for them now and for the next month or so. Blossoms are followed by thin half-inch capsules holding seeds that may be plucked by a bird or blown by the wind.
What can be done with it?
Spanish moss has been a most useful commodity for many years. It was used to stuff horse collars, car seats, and furniture cushions. Moss mills flourished in Florida until the 1950s, when the last mill, in Gainesville, burned in 1963.
“Moss pullin’” was a way for poor folks, both White and Black, to make some spare change in hard times. A pole with nails stuck through it was used to pull the moss from the trees. Sometimes snakes and sleeping bats came down with the moss. Children often cleaned the leaves and twigs out before taking the moss to a mill, where they may be paid a penny or so a pound.
The mill workers would spread the moss in ditches and cover it with dirt for a few months, until the gray-green covering rotted off. The black, curly, wiry core of the moss was then dug up, hung on fences, and washed and left to dry. Then the fibers were combed in a ginning machine and baled, ready to ship to an upholstery factory.
Today, what’s going on with it?
The decline of the moss industry was caused primarily by the development of foam rubber for cushions. Now, Spanish moss is used mostly by garden and florist’s shops as decoration around plants and bouquets, either green or dried.
I like Spanish moss. I use it to make my Christmas wreath for the door, wrapping a grapevine base with it and tying it on with a ribbon, then inserting magnolia leaves, sandpine cones, coontie fronds, and other native items among the moss curls.
Right now, I’m searching daily for the tiny green blossoms.
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Thanks for reading!
Your writer on the wing,
Charlene
Linda Goddard
Charlene,
I love Peggy’s connection and reverence, of a sort, for Nature! This article is both informative and an enjoyment for me.
This air plant–I have to call it Spanish Moss ;-)–in summer gets my summer dreaming going and reminds me to slow down, sit near the trees, glance a lot at the lovely moss hanging down, and just be present for myself and the Earth.
Thank you for your “Caring for Mother Nature” posts, and please send my appreciation to Peggy.
Hugs,
Linda