3*4 



Minnesota Plant Life. 



Of these plants, the soft, red, hard and black maples are large 

 and handsome trees, while the moosewood and mountain maples 

 are small trees or shrubs. The black maple has a rough black 

 bark. The sugar-maple is utilized in the manufacture of sugar, 

 obtained by boiling down its copious sap in the springtime. 

 The red maple has scarlet or crimson bark on the younger trees. 

 The soft maple has whitish bark with leaves more notched than 

 in the hard or black varieties. The moosewood maple has 

 leaves with two deep notches making three sharp lobes toward 

 the end. All the lobes are about equal in size. The mountain 



maple has leaves 

 similarly three- 

 lobed,but the middle 

 lobe is much the 

 largest. 



Soft maples. The 

 soft maples are 

 abundantly planted 

 in Minnesota for 

 shade trees, for 

 which purpose, how- 

 ever, they are not so 

 valuable as hard ma- 

 ples. Under favor- 

 able conditions they 

 grow to be large 

 trees, over a hun- 

 dred feet in height. The branches are brittle and many of them 

 are markedly pendulous like the branches of the weeping wil- 

 lows. The leaves are five-lobed, bright green above and whit- 

 ish or silvery below. In autumn they turn yellow. The flowers 

 are produced in little heads on short lateral branches, and there 

 are two kinds, staminate and pistillate, often borne on the 

 same, but sometimes on different trees. The fruits hang on 

 slender, drooping stems, and very often one side of the fruit 

 fails to mature. As soon as the seeds fall to the ground, or 

 the next season, they may germinate, and the seedlings develop 

 their first leaves and terminal bud during June. Maple wood, 

 from this species, is hard and is used in the manufacture of 



FIG. 153. lyeaves and flowers of the sugar-maple. After 

 Atkinson. 



