Must-Photograph Snowy White Silvergrass Fields This Autumn — New IG Spots at Mei Bridge & Sweetroot Grass

Text by Scenic Spots Home, compiled & reported
 
Autumn is just around the corner. Beyond the fiery red maples and the swaying silvergrass hills, it’s also the peak blooming season for sweetroot grass. Vast silvery-white flower spikes dot the riverbed near Mituo Temple and the newly built bridge, adding a desolate yet romantic atmosphere to the scenery.

This “Mituo Moon Reflection Bridge” by the Bajhang River in Chiayi is a newly opened pedestrian landscape cable-stayed bridge from last year. With its elegant single-tower cable-stayed curves and white bridge deck, the silvery waves of sweetroot grass under the blue sky and white clouds carry a hint of Japanese-style romance, while the bridge’s illuminated lighting at night is also highly eye-catching.

Not only the Mituo Moon Reflection Bridge—on the opposite riverbank, you can see an orange-roofed building, which is one of the “Eight Scenic Spots of Chiayi,” the Mituo Temple. The Mituo Zen Temple beside Zhongyi Bridge, mirrored against the endless white sweetroot grass swaying in the wind, gives the entire scene a time-traveling feel back to ancient times.

Sweetroot grass is highly resilient and is often confused with five-sectioned silvergrass, reeds, and giant reeds. If you uproot sweetroot grass and suck on its roots, you’ll taste a faint sweetness. Its flowers are silky, brush-like spikes, snow-white in color, typically blooming around Mid-Autumn Festival in mid-September. It mainly grows in low-altitude, arid riverbed gravel areas, and when it blooms, it covers entire fields in a spectacular display.