Northern white-cedar swamp
(“Cedar Swamp” “All Cedar” “The Great Cedar Swamp” “Black Ash, some Tamarack, and much Cedar”)
Along Harbor Brook, Geddes Brook, and lakeshore near the current mouth of Onondaga Creek. Also near current Ley Creek and site of present day Carousel Mall.
Along with salt marshes, cedar swamps were the defining wetland type for Onondaga Lake, especially for the part that became developed as the city of Syracuse. In fact cedar swamps covered a much larger area of land than salt marshes, following the former courses of both Geddes and Harbor Brooks as mentioned above. The Great Lodi Swamp, a cedar/tamarack wetland, once extended from Erie Boulevard to Onondaga Lake (D. Leopold, pers. comm.).
Northern white cedar swamps are conifer or mixed swamps that occurs on organic soils in cool, poorly drained depressions in central and northern New York, and along lakes and streams in the northern half of the state (Edinger et al. 2002). These swamps are often spring fed or enriched by seepage of cold, minerotrophic groundwater, resulting in a stable water table and continually saturated soils. Soils are often rich in calcium. Mature cedar swamps display extreme microtopography, often described in terms of "hummocks" and "hollows," which creates microhabitat variation in terms of localized hydrology, light, and biogeochemical regimes. No cedar swamp description would be complete without mentioning bryophytes (mosses and liverworts), which may carpet large areas of the forest floor. Mosses include Sphagnum spp. and feather mosses (Hylocomium splendens, Ptilium crista-canadensis). Characteristic liverworts are Bazzania trilobata and Trichocolea tomentella.
In fact, an impressive array of rare and uncommon plant species often occur in cedar swamps; they are botanically rich in vascular plants (such as trees, ferns, wildflowers) as well as mosses (including the lovely feather mosses (Hylocomium splendens and Ptilium crista-castrensis). The Great Lodi Swamp (mentioned above) was considered “the most interesting small swamp, for botanists, in central New York” (Wibbe 1883). It supported many rare plants including the following orchids:
Arethusa bulbosa dragon’s mouth
Calopogon tuberosus tuberous grasspink
Calypso bulbosa fairy slipper
Cypripedium parviflorum yellow lady’s slipper
Cypripedium candidum white lady’s slipper
Platanthera grandiflora greater purple fringed orchid
Numerous other species of interest inhabited this swamp (M. Faust, unpubl. list based on Goodrich 1912). Many species you will find listed below in the species descriptions. Given the contiguous habitat, it is quite plausible that many of these plants occurred where the swamp extended to Onondaga Lake.
An early name for the swampy area in what is now downtown Syracuse was Na-ta-dunk, translated as “pine tree with broken top hanging down.” Oh-na-ta-tunk, “among the pines,” was another Onondaga name for this wetland (Beauchamp 1908). The swamp with visually prominent white pines corroborates other sources of information about the historical condition of this area, and seems plausible based on the structure of present day wetlands such as Nelson Swamp near Cazenovia. With this analogue in mind, we can imagine white pines rising above the canopy of a cedar swamp, likely serving as nest sites for bald eagles or osprey. The latter piscivorous raptor now nests in cell phone towers, today’s structural equivalent of a towering white pine snag.
There are other historical references to cedars in the Syracuse area, although not one of these trees remain standing today:
Large White Cedar swamps are frequent here, but the larger trees have vanished (Beauchamp 1923).
The vicinity of South Salina, Tallman Streets and Cortland Ave where the street car barns are now located, was a cedar swamp. Post Standard June 28, 1925
Syracuse to the east was then bounded by an almost impassable cedar swamp running from the canal along the foot of the Academy hill [SU?], down to Danforth where our cow used to get stuck in the muck, and I, too, sometimes, when trying to get her out.
(Morgan, no date, OHA)
An early Salina resident recalls in this passage the early wetlands of Syracuse including the “logs and fallen trees” typical of cedar swamps:
We early settled at this spot, then a wild, rude, uncultivated region, destitute of almost everything (musquitoes [sic] and fever-ague excepted) . . . scenes presented directly within the heart of the city where is now erected the most magnificent structures. Such as groping our way through the swamps over logs and fallen trees and brush to prevent sinking into the mire, while the croaking of frogs announced what region was beneath us (Moseley 1850).
The closed canopy of cedar swamps creates a cool, dark forest floor. Cedar swamps are generally associated with mineral-enriched groundwater seepage. Seasonal flooding is not characteristic of these areas; i.e., water levels are relatively stable, though that condition can vary. Cedar swamps grow on organic (muck), usually calcareous, soils, often with wood fragments throughout.
The characteristic tree of these swamps is northern white cedar, Thuja occidentalis. Woody associates include tamarack (Larix laricina), black ash (Fraxinus nigra), hemlock (Tsuga canadensis), all documented for Onondaga Lake (Anonymous 1800), as well as white pine (Pinus strobus) and yellow birch (Betula alleghaniensis). Leaning trees, blowdowns are common in mature cedar swamps, resulting in hummock and hollow microtopography formed by decaying downed trees or tip-up mounds. Feather mosses (as mentioned above) and leafy liverworts such as Bazzania trilobata and Trichocolea tomentella carpet the hummocky forest floor.
As implied above, cedar swamps tend to be rich botanically. Herbaceous plants include goldthread (Coptis trifolia), bunchberry (Cornus canadensis), twinflower (Linnaea borealis), starflower (Trientalis borealis), blue bead lily (Clintonia borealis), snowberry (Gaultheria hispidula), partridgeberry (Mitchella repens). Ferns such as royal fern (mentioned by Pursh [1869]), cinnamon fern, sensitive and marsh ferns sprout from the hollows. Paine (1865) reports finding walking fern (Camptosorus rhizophyllus), abounding on old logs, stumps, and knolls in a cedar swamp west of Onondaga Lake.
Species accounts:
northern white cedar, arbor-vitae Thuja occidentalis
Northern white cedar is a signature species for the CNY area. (Note: white cedar should not be confused with eastern red-cedar (Juniperus virginiana), the source of cedar chips for gerbil cages and wood for cedar chests). John Bartram describes northern white-cedars growing in calcareous seeps in what may be the East side of the Valley section of Syracuse:
This morning after breakfast, I went to the east hill, and found a fine spring on the
west side, surrounded with Arbor Vitae, some a foot diameter, this water is of such a petrifying nature, that as it runs among the fallen leaves it incrusts them and petrifies in great stones as big as one can well lift . . .(Bartram 1751, page 57)
He may have been at one of the historical fens or cedar swamps near Glen Ave., for example. He also describes cedars observed else in the Onondaga Valley:
We hired a guide to go with us to the salt spring, 4 or 5 miles off, down the river [Onondaga Creek], on the west side of the mouth; being most of the way good land and near the mouth very rich; from whence it runs westward near a quarter of a mile, a kind of sandy beach adjoining to the bank of the river, containing 4 or 5 acres. Here the Indians dig holes about 2 feet deep [to collect brine] . . . There was a family residing at this time . . . We filled our gallon keg full of water and brought it to Town, where we boiled it to about a pound of salt. . . . About half way there is an excellent spring of water, and by it a grove of Curboritae [Arbor Vitae] joining to a green swamp, producing very high grass.
This “very high grass” could be—native Phragmites; Calamogrostis canadensis, ??
The resistance to rot made cedar the wood of choice for shingles, and in fact a “roofing” mill, which probably used cedar shakes, appears in the Valley section of Syracuse on an 1874 map (Valley map 1874). “Thuya,” wrote Peter Kalm, “is esteemed for resisting putrefaction more than any other wood” (Kalm 1972). In Philadelphia in 1748, Peter Kalm writes about “Cupressus thyoides”:
Swamps and morasses were formerly full of them, but at present these trees are for the greatest part cut down, and no attempt has been made yet to plant new ones (Kalm 1972 p. 26).
The same could be said for Syracuse at this time, and few cedars associated with natural areas remain in the city limits (although arbor-vitae has become a popular ornamental tree for around the home).
Cedar also has important medicinal properties. It earned it the name “arbor-vitae” for its power to cure or prevent scurvy. In 1535, Jacques Cartier and his sailors spent the winter in ships along the St. Lawrence River, near Montreal, and became desperately ill with scurvy:
In spite of this we were sorely visited with the epidemic, unknown and mysterious to us; the sick lost flesh and their legs became swollen, muscles contracted and black as coal; covered with purple blood blisters. Then the disease affected the thighs and shoulders, arms and neck. In each instance, the mouth was so diseased that the flesh fell off, even to the roots of the teeth, and nearly all the teeth fell out.
The Iroquoian indigenous people showed Cartier how to make a tea from an evergreen tree growing commonly about them. “This tree, they said, cured all diseases; they call the tree in their language ‘ameda.’” And indeed, the French gradually improved upon drinking the beverage made from the leaves of this tree.
and may have been used in the construction of palisade fortresses (Anderson 1982).
Indigenous uses: as incense, disinfectant, headache, coughs, deodorant (Moerman 2012)
For craft uses, check that thin little book from Bird—Carrie Lyford
eastern white pine Pinus strobus
Eastern white pine is the tallest evergreen tree in New York State, and a particularly apt species for Onondaga Lake. Known as the Tree of Peace, the white pine’s needles occur in clusters of five, bound together just as the Five Nations of the Haudenosaunee came together to form the Confederacy on the north shore of Onondaga Lake.
As mentioned above, an early name for the swampy area in what is now downtown Syracuse was Na-ta-dunk, translated as “pine tree with broken top hanging down.” Oh-na-ta-tunk, “among the pines,” was another early name for this swamp (Beauchamp 1908).
Immigrant settlers saw in white pine a valuable timber species. In 1797, James Geddes gave up his salt boiling operation to set up a sawmill along Geddes Brook, just upstream from what is now Fairmount Fair. The site, he reported, has a “quantity of very valuable white pine timber close by.” Pine plank 80’ long and 4” thick comprise the sides of a boat, and commanded a good price. Geddes was not alone, and several sawmills sprung up in order to cash in on the pines.
Beauchamp (1923) reports that white pine apparently thrived in the northern towns of the county, where “it grows in large numbers and of a great size.”
“The Tall Pine of Lysander,” James L. Voorhees, Sr., cleared away large groves of this and others did the same on a smaller scale, burning trunk and branches in vast heaps, whose embers still blacken the soil. The choicer trunks went to the sawmill, and many a root helped form a lasting fence. We had good shingles, too, while the pine lasted. Mr. George Geddes told of the size of these great trees. One in Camillus was 230 feet high, and other furnished 154 feet of saw logs.
White pine has a long history in the area around Onondaga Lake. Both Clark (1849) and Geddes (1860) describe finding pine logs deep (86 feet and 134 feet, respectively) below the surface while drilling for salt along the lake’s shoreline. These logs, in other words, were apparently buried in the sediments.
Eastern white pine has medicinal and edible values as well. Chopped pine needles can be made into a tea high in vitamin C; historically, this beverage helped save European explorers suffering from scurvy. Pine resin is an effective antibiotic, so the inner bark can be applied to wounds, stings, sores. The inner bark can also be dried and used for food.
eastern hemlock Tsuga canadensis
According to Geddes (1860), hemlock was “very plenty in almost every part of the county, but it was most abundant in the northern half. This valuable timber has been used extensively for building, fencing, and making plank roads.”
eastern larch, tamarack Larix laricina
This tree is documented for Onondaga Lake wetlands (Anonymous 1800) and the contiguous “Tamarack Swamp.” It is unique in that it produces cones (so is a “coni-fer,” or cone bearing tree), yet also loses its leaves each fall. Most familiar conifers (such as pines, spruce, fir) are evergreen, so the tamarack is unusual in this sense.
yellow birch Betula alleghaniensis
mountain holly Nemopanthus mucronata
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
spicebush, wild allspice Lindera benzoin
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
huckleberry Gaylussacia baccata
Tamarack Swamp.
highbush blueberry Vaccinium corymbosum L.
Blueberries were also known as whortleberries (Kalm 1972) and mentioned fairly regularly in the historical journals of early travelers to CNY (e.g., Moravian missionaries?). A valued food source, blueberries of various species were collected and dried for winter use (Parker 1910).
V. corymbosum is the blueberry widely cultivated by commercial growers. In the wild, it is found in peatlands of moderate to high acidity. This plant grew in the Tamarack Swamp and other wetlands throughout Onondaga County; Goodrich calls it “frequent” (1912). It does best in full sun, so establishes best in forest openings, as along the edges of lakes.
Blueberries are high in iron and also recognized for their antioxidant qualities.
velvetleaf blueberry Vaccinium myrtilloides
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
cranberry Vaccinium macrocarpon Aiton OBL
Known as atoka to native people, cranberry was described by the Jesuits in 1657, somewhere in the area north of Onondaga Lake:
God gave us a small wild fruit, called here Atoka. The young people went to gather it in the neighboring meadows, and, although it is neither palatable nor substantial, hunger made us find it excellent. It is almost of the color and size of a small cherry.
I know of no records for cranberry in the wetlands right around Onondaga Lake, probably because the substrate was insufficiently acidic. But certainly it occurs in Onondaga County, including Cicero Swamp and Beaver Lake.
Beauchamp (1923) wrote that “large and small cranberries both occur here but in very small numbers.”
Loskiel (1794) writes that there are “ two sorts of cranberries; the one grows in swampy places upon a short shrub, not as high as bilberry bushes, which is our common cranberry (vaccinum oxycoccus), the other upon a small tree.” The latter plant is likely American cranberrybush, described under maple-ash hardwood swamp and also producing edible red fruits (otherwise it is not closely related to the first cranberry).
According to Kalm (1972), “quantities” of cranberries “are sent over, preserved, to Europe and to the West Indies.” He notes that they are very sour, but adds that sugar was readily available due to the proximity of “sugar-plantations.”
winterberry Ilex verticillata
Tamarack Swamp.
leatherwood, moose wood Dirca palustris FAC
The Haudenosaunee made twine and thread from the inner bark of this shrub (Lyford 1945). Pursh found leatherwood on the same day (July 20, 1807) he found the hart’s tongue fern at Split Rock, and probably in similar habitat. Leatherwood is associated with calcareous soils, such as those at Split Rock and in Clark Reservation.
beaked hazelnut Corylus cornuta
No records for Onondaga Lake, but there are records from near Ram's Gulch, Fabius Swamp, and other parts of Onondaga County (Hough 2012).
shrubby cinquefoil Potentilla fruticosa
This wetland shrub belongs to the Rose family, yet has handsome, bright buttercup-like flowers. It’s documented from the Tamarack Swamp (Faust no date?) along Erie Boulevard.
Salix myrtilloides
black chokeberry Photinia melanocarpa FAC (formerly Aronia melanocarpa, Pyrus melanocarpa)
Recorded for Onondaga Lake by Goodrich (1912).
buffaloberry, soapberry, russet buffaloberry, soopollalie Shepherdia canadensis
Paine (1865) reports the occurrence of this plant along the east banks of Onondaga Lake, and Goodrich cites its presence at the “Mud Lock” (the lock near the outlet of Onondaga Lake). Pursh found it in 1807 along the Lake Ontario shore near Oswego. A nitrogen fixer, soapberry can survive in poor soils, and occurs along rocky shores and banks of streams. It belongs to the Oleaster family.
Native peoples of the Pacific Northwest prize the berries, which they whipped into a frothy comestible:
The all-around-favorite food made from this fruit is a light frothy whip, of the consistency of beaten egg whites, made by thoroughly whisking the berries until they form a stiff, whipped-cream-like mixture. Sometimes called “Indian ice cream,” this special confection (nowadays sweetened with sugar, honey or even bananas) is served especially at family gatherings and feasts (Turner 2005).
Traditional sweeteners included salal berries, camas bulbs, or hemlock cambium. The berries—small, soft, and somewhat bitter—can be used fresh, dried, or frozen, and are valued for their medicinal properties. Twigs, leaves, berries, and juice have been used for various medicinal purposes (Moermann 1998).
Herbaceous
starflower Trientalis borealis
robin runaway, false violet Dalibarda repens
Pursh 1807 (according to Beauchamp 1924)
wintergreen Gaultheria procumbens
partridge berry Mitchella repens
northern wood sorrel Oxalis acetosella
Indian cucumber Medeola virginiana
This lily family member can be recognized by the circle of 5-7 elongate leaves along the solitary stem, topped by a second circlet of leaves from which emerge spider-like flowers having recurved, straw-colored petals. Underground the plant has a horizontal white rhizome the size of a small thumb. Indian cucumber is best known from damp to wet hardwood, conifer, and mixed hardwood-conifer forests. It’s found mainly in cool, northern forests. It could have occurred in the cedar and tamarack swamps around Onondaga Lake.
The rhizome of this plant is edible and tastes like cucumber, hence the common name Indian cucumber root. De Witt Clinton reports eating the root of this plant while proceeding down the Oswego River just north of Three Rivers in 1810. Clinton (1849 p.73) writes:
At this place we tasted the wild cucumber, the root of which is white and pleasant, with a spicy, pleasant taste. Why it is called the cucumber is not easy to imagine, as there is no point of resemblance.
Of course, it’s possible that state senator Clinton was eating an entirely different plant from Medeola virginiana, since he does mention its spicy taste. We will never know for sure what plant he ate, but Medeola is our best guess at present.
goldthread Coptis trifolia FACW
Record for Tamarack Swamp. An important medicinal plant, goldthread had craft uses as well:
Collections of Iroquois handicrafts sometimes include miniature baskets the size of a thimble, made of the root of the gold thread plant (Lyford 1945).
bunchberry Cornus canadensis
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
twinflower Linnaea borealis
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
blue bead lily Clintonia borealis
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
snowberry Gaultheria hispidula
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
partridgeberry Mitchella repens
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
gaywings Polygala paucifolia FACU
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
devil’s walking stick Aralia spinosa FAC
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
longstyle sweetroot Osmorhiza longistylis
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
sticky tofieldia Triantha glutinosa (Michx.) Baker (formerly Tofieldia glutinosa)
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
largeflower bellwort Uvularia grandiflora
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
Endangered in New Hampshire and Connecticut.
Listed in Bartram’s Herbal. According to Bartram:
. . . the Root is white, and spreads like a Crow’s Foot; some People call it by that Name for that Reason; it is good root for gathering and breaking a Boil, and makes a fine Salve for healing Wounds and Ulcers; it makes a fine maturating Poultice.
mountain deathcamas Zigadenus elegans ssp. glaucus
Record for Tamarack Swamp. Listed as Threatened in NYS.
Comandra umbellata?
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
Geum rivale
Record for Tamarack Swamp.
Triosteum aurantiacum var. aurantiacum
Tamarack Swamp; Rust Falls; Drumlins; Lafayette Road; Jamesville Green Lake; Brittons Woods; DL&W; Oak Openings; Bradford Hills; Route 20 Swamp; Cross Lake; one mile west of Watervale. (T. perfoliatum var. aurantiacum)