Ancient Underwater Cypress Forest

Ancient Underwater Cypress Forest

Little information is available on this particular subject in this specific area. I recently had a tease and thought I would share my pictures with you all.

Here's a couple of articles online about what I am referring to—

The ancient cypress forest found 60 feet underwater in the Gulf of Mexico, due south of Gulf Shores, Ala., is about 60,000 years old, says a team of scientists who have studied the site.

The forest appears to be a wholly unique relic of our planet’s past, the only known site where a coastal ice age forest this old has been preserved in place, with thousands of trees still rooted in the dirt they were growing millennia ago.

Alabama's 60,000-year-old underwater forest spills its secrets in new documentary

Sixty feet beneath the green waves of the Gulf of Mexico, ten miles from the nearest land, stands an ancient forest of giant trees.
Covered in dense carpets of sea anemones, crawling with spidery arrow crabs and toadfish, the sprawling stumps of massive cypress trees spread across the seafloor.

Nick Tew, a geologist with the Geological Survey of Alabama, said that the stumps had likely been preserved for millenia by virtue of being buried beneath a few feet of sand, which prevented oxygen from reaching them. The same phenomenon is responsible for bones and remnants preserved in peat bogs and other oxygen-deprived locations.

“We know its pretty old. We have some stumps on the Fort Morgan peninsula, on the Gulf beach side. We had those dated and they are about 2,000 years old. Those are exposed on the beach today.”

Ancient forest lies 10 miles off the Alabama coast

I would love to go diving around where I took these just to see how massive this really is.
Here are some pictures I took at Fort Morgan. These stumps were solid as a rock. The high tide hid them for several days, managed to get these on the last day we were there.
Pretty wild. What is ya'lls thoughts? Makes me wonder how many more forests there could be in the oceans around the world that have not been discovered or revealed yet.

a reply to: M4ngo

I would love to go diving around where I took these just to see how massive this really is.

Then do it and report back to us with picts please!

Very nice thread.

a reply to: M4ngo

Very very cool. Whats fascinating to me is their presumed age of around 12k years old placing them within the window of the end of the ice age/ lesser Dryas time frame.

The article states a belief of gradual sea rise which Im sure happened, however what if the comet impact theory being bandied about lately ends up being true...this forest might of been swallowed up much more dramatically and quickly.

a reply to: BlueJacket

They think they're 50k-60k years old

originally posted by: angeldoll

Go to 15:55 in the video and you'll see some divers carrying one larger than a human.

a reply to: andrew778

Actually if you read the article it states 60 feet down 12k years. I tried to copy it from the story but you can click on the link and read it yourself. Eta its from the second link Im getting my info...same site...weird


Lol not so weird...they were covered 12k years ago...the forest itself being 60k.

a reply to: BlueJacket

They said it was another ice age before the last one. 60k old


I'm halfway through the video
Fascinating find.

To think how different our world was
The so called climate chNges might be naturally occurring cycles.

I have 70ft cypress trees on my property. I'm in BC. I didn't know those lumps on the lower ends iof the trunks were called knees. The roots grow crazy thick. Quite invasive. They must be well established under the sea bed.

We have so much more to discover in our world, in the oceans.

Thanks for the thread S&F