STUDIES OF TREES IN WINTER 



streams with clear, sandy bottoms, one rarely 

 comes across it. It is a tree to look for on a 

 canoeing trip, and when one discovers its long, 

 drooping branches hanging over the stream, 

 the feeling of isolation is complete; a silver 

 maple on a river bank accentuates the sense of 

 being in the country, just as the notes of the 

 hermit thrush accentuate the sense of remote- 

 ness in the woods. 



In winter there are two distinct characteris- 

 tics by which one may distinguish the silver 

 maple from the red which it closely resem- 

 bles, the curving tips of the lower branches 

 which sweep down and curve up in a pro- 

 nounced way unlike the red maple, and the 

 manner in which the bark peels off from the 

 old trunks, in long pieces which are free 

 at either end and attached in the middle, 

 while the bark of the red maple splits up 

 and down the trunk without shagging in 

 strips. 



The wood of the silver maple is soft and 

 perishable and is seldom used. 



The former name of this tree was Acer 

 dasycarpum, but it has been changed to Acer 

 saccharinum, the old name for the sugar maple, 

 Acer saccharum. 



It is found growing wild along river banks 



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