656 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



ACER PLATANOIDES, Norway Maple 



Acer platanoides, Linnseus, Sf. PI. 1055 (1755); Loudon, Arb. el Frut. Brit. i. 408 (1838); 

 Willkomm, Forstliche Flora, 757 (1887); Mathieu, Flore Forestiere, 41 (1897). 



A tree, attaining occasionally 90 feet in height, but usually smaller. Bark 

 smooth on young trees, but ultimately becoming rough and fissured longitudinally. 

 Young branchlets glabrous, not remaining green throughout the first year. Leaves 

 (Plate 206, Fig. 11) averaging 5 inches long by 7 inches wide, five-lobed ; lobes 

 oblong with an acuminate bristle-pointed apex ; sinuses wide, rounded and open, 

 not reaching the middle of the leaf; base cordate ; margin non-ciliate and with a 

 few large sinuate pointed teeth ; both surfaces shining, green, and glabrous, 

 except for tufts of pubescence in the axils of the primary and secondary nerves 

 beneath ; petiole with milky sap. 



Flowers, opening early before the leaves expand, in erect corymbs, yellowish- 

 green ; the earliest mostly staminate, those opening later perfect ; stamens 8, as long 

 as the sepals ; pedicels, calyx, corolla, filaments, and ovary glabrous. Fruit pendulous, 

 on long stalks, glabrous ; keys about if inch long ; wings widely divergent. 



In summer the Norway maple is readily distinguishable by the leaves shining 

 on both surfaces, with long pointed lobes and teeth, and by the milky sap in the 

 petioles. In winter the twigs are shining, glabrous, with very narrow three-dotted 

 leaf-scars, the opposite pairs of which are joined at the ends around the stem. 

 Terminal buds ^ inch long, sessile ; scales shining, either green at the base and 

 reddish-brown above, or reddish-brown throughout, glabrous, ciliate. Lateral buds 

 appressed to the stem. 



Varieties 



A large number of varieties have appeared in cultivation, of which the most 

 noteworthy are : 



1. Var. laciniatum, Alton,' Eagle's Claw or Hawk's-foot Maple. Said by 

 Loudon to have originated in the seed-bed. Leaves (Plate 205, Fig. 10) about half 

 the size of the type, cuneate at the base ; lobes acutely, deeply, and irregularly cut ; 

 margin rolled up. This variety usually attains to no great size, but Sir Hugh 

 Beevor tells us of a tree at Gelderstone Hall near Beccles, Suffolk, 50 feet high by 

 2 feet 8 inches in girth ; and Renwick in 1 907 measured one at Auchendrane, 

 Ayrshire, 48 feet by 3 feet 2 inches. 



2. Var. dissectum, Jacquin fil. (var. palmatum, Koch '') {A. Lorbergi, Van 

 Houtte). Leaves (Plate 206, Fig. 21) deeply cut to near the base, which is cordate ; 

 lobes five, ending in long sharp points, the three upper lobes again divided into 

 three lobules ; margin with a few sharp-pointed teeth. First introduced from 

 Belgium in 1845 by Knight of Chelsea, it grows to be a fair-sized tree, and is worth 

 cultivating on account of its elegantly cut foliage. 



' Hort. Kem, iii. 435 (1789). ' Dendrologie, i. 530 (1869). 



