Sugar Maple 



649 



3-lobed, or sometimes 5-lobed, usually cor- 

 date or truncate at the base, very light 

 green or nearly white beneath, often 12 cm. 

 across; the pointed lobes are very coarsely 

 toothed or again lobed. The flowers are 

 dioecious, so far as they are known, and 

 appear before the leaves very early in the 

 season. The samaras are larger than those 

 of the Red maple, being 3.5 to 6.2 cm. long, 

 nearly erect or somewhat divergent, with a 

 wing I to 2 cm. in width. 



The persistently woolly leaves and large 

 fruit seem to mark this southern tree as 

 specifically different from the northern Red 

 maple. 



The wood of Drummond's maple is very 

 similar to that of the Red maple. 



Fig. 600. Drummond's Maple. 



13. SUGAR MAPLE Acer Saccharum Marshall 



Acer saccharinum Wangenheim, not Linnaeus 



The Sugar maple prefers rocky uplands, and is often called Rock maple. Sugar 

 tree, and Hard maple; it is a grand tree, sometimes attaining a height of 40 meters, 



with a trunk diameter of 1.5 meters, perfect 

 specimens appearing when in leaf, like great 

 round domes. It ranges from Newfoundland 

 to Georgia, but south of Mar}'land is rare near 

 the coast, and extends westward to Manitoba, 

 Nebraska, and Texas. 



The bark of aid trunks is channelled, brown 

 and scaly, that of young ones light brown and 

 smooth. The young twigs are smooth and 

 green, but soon become brown or orange- 

 brown; the inner bud-scales are silky, becom- 

 ing 2 to 4 cm. long in unfolding, and hght ycl- 

 \o\\\ The long-stalked spreading leaves are 

 rather thin in texture, dark green above, paler 

 green or quite glaucous beneath, hair}' on the 

 under side when young, but nearly or quite 

 smooth when mature; they are orbicular in out- 

 line or wider than long, 5-Iobed or 3-lobcd, 8 

 to 15 cm. broad, and more or less cordate at 



Fig. 601. 



Sugar Maple, 

 the base; the pointed lobes var\' from coarsely toothed to entire-margined. The 



