Amazing Evergreen Roots

I have 3 long skinny flower boxes in my back yard. Each one is probably about 4 feet long and 8 inches wide. I used to plant flowers in them until I got bit by something and sidelined from gardening for several years. Well last year I started the garden back up and this year I'm hoping to plant some flowers again if I can find any. The boxes need a good paint job so I decided to empty out the old dirt into the bottom for some large planters. One of the planters had a hemlock shrub sprout in it about 5 years ago. I've left it grow so I decided to transplant it at the same time into another large nursery pot. Well I tried to get a shovel full of dirt out of another container but couldn't get the shovel in. So I went with plan B and just pulled the hemlock out. To my surprise the whole contents of the box came out in one piece.

Turns out nearly all the dirt was gone. It's just a big ball of roots. A really neat ball of roots. Here's a close up.

I thought the top was moss but turns out they are some kind of evergreen too. No clue what kind. They haven't grown any and just stay about that size. Only the green tops were above the top of the pot. Everything under that line used to be Miracle Gro potting mix. I cut this one down to fit into the nursery pot. Not sure what I'm going to do with the other 2 boxes yet. Might have to do some research to see if I can find out what they are. See if they are worth saving or just some kind of evergreen weed. If there even is such a thing.

Hard to believe they were living and in the case of the hemlock growing with almost no dirt in an elevated box so long periods of no water too.