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[NASA] The Forested Floodplains of Congaree National Park

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Earth Observatory
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  3. The Forested Floodplains of…
 
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The
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on
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captured this image of the Congaree River winding through floodplain forests in Congaree National Park on August 18, 2025.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison

Among the

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, few are as defined by a single river’s floodplain as
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in South Carolina. While the features are also prominent in
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, a full 80 percent of Congaree National Park lies within the Congaree River floodplain.

It’s a place home to one of the largest intact tracts of old-growth

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in the United States. In this image captured by the
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(Operational Land Imager) on
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, the river winds through the forested plain, along with curving bands of green that trace old channels, ridges, and swales left behind as the river gradually migrated across it. Slight differences in elevation in these
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and other landforms affect how frequently they flood, producing distinct ecosystems that appear in contrasting shades of green.

The river flows through flat, soft terrain, which encourages the formation of

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. Water typically flows faster on the outside of bends, leading to more rapid
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as the channel carves into the outer riverbank. It moves more slowly on the inside of bends, resulting in the
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of sediment and the growth of sandy features called
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. Over time, this process can cut off a bend from the main river channel, forming U-shaped
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.

The National Park Service

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Weston Lake, 1.2 miles (1.9 kilometers) from the visitor center, as one of the park’s most permanent oxbow lakes, noting that it is relatively deep and lacks the shallow clay and silt layer found in most of the park’s other oxbow lakes, such as
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. On the right side of the image is
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a roughly 4-mile-long abandoned channel of the Congaree River and one of the longest oxbow lakes in South Carolina. Over time, abandoned channels and oxbow lakes can fill with sediment and become shallow wetlands. Some of these low-lying, water-filled features are known as
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, where flood-tolerant
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tend to grow.

While loggers targeted forests along the Congaree in the 1880s,

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such as frequent flooding, interminably muddy roads, and mosquito-plagued conditions meant that most of the floodplain forests escaped the widespread logging that transformed other parts of the Southeast. By the 1950s, conservationists had begun to recognize how rare old-growth forests of this type had become in the region. Congress designated the area a national monument in 1976, and it became a national park in 2003.

As the river snakes its way through the park’s mostly flat terrain, it overflows its banks several times per year, usually in the winter and early spring but also in the summer and fall after hurricanes and major rainstorms. These floods distribute broad layers of nutrient-rich silt throughout the floodplain, nourishing the forests and contributing to the high concentration of unusually large trees in the park.

Over the decades, Congaree National Park has harbored a remarkable array of giant

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that have held national and state size records for their species. Though individual trees have gained and lost champion status as they have been damaged, have died, or been surpassed by newly measured trees elsewhere, Congaree trees such as the possumhaw (Ilex decidua), water hickory (Carya aquatica), loblolly pine (Pinus taeda), laurel oak (Quercus laurifolia), swamp tupelo (Nyssa biflora), and sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua) have held records at times.

During this

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, celebrate by exploring Earth Observatory’s
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. You can also check out the offerings of
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, a collaborative program that connects NASA science with park service rangers across the nation.   

NASA Earth Observatory image by Michala Garrison, using Landsat data from the 

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. Story by Adam Voiland.

Downloads

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August 18, 2025

JPEG (13.48 MB)

References & Resources

  • American Forests (2009)
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • Atlas Obscura (2025, May 12)
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • Discover South Carolina,
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • National Parks Conservation Association (2024, March 27)
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.  
  • National Parks Conservation Association (2017)
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.  
  • National Park Maps,
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.  
  • National Park Service,
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • National Park Service,
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.  
  • National Park Service (2014)
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.
  • U.S. Geological Survey
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    . Accessed August 27, 2026.

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