The Angel Oak on Johns Island, photographed from underneath and close in.

Look along the tops of the limbs and you can see the tree carrying its own small ecosystem — fern and moss growing green straight out of the bark, following each branch outward. Several limbs are long enough that they have come back down and are resting on the ground under their own weight. The ground itself is swept bare dirt. Light comes through the canopy in pieces rather than all at once.

How old it is depends on who you ask. Most arborists settle on four to five hundred years. You will hear fifteen hundred from people out on the road.

Almost entirely green and grey. It reads as calm from across a room and rewards standing close to it.