SUGAR MAPLE 279 



warm day, but the flow is greatest in late winter and early 

 spring, ceasing as the buds swell. The trees are " tapped " 

 and the sap gathered and evaporated, producing the well- 

 known delicious maple sugar and syrup, a large amount 

 of which is annually manufactured in the Northern States. 

 The three or four outer annual layers of sapwood yield 

 nearly all the sap, which contains more saccharine matter 

 than flows from any other tree except Hickory, from which 

 latter tree, however, there is a very slight discharge. 



It is a prolific seed-bearer after the age of thirty-five 

 or forty years, but seldom produces any before that. The 

 seeds ripen early in autumn and are so well known that a 

 description of them is not worth while. They should be 

 gathered as soon as ripe and stratified in moist sand but 

 by no means very moist and kept in a cool place where 

 they will not dry out. Freezing will not injure them. They 

 can be sown in the seed-bed in late fall or early spring. 

 Unfortunately the percentage of fertility is low, frequently 

 not averaging twenty-five per cent ; hence they should be 

 sown thick enough to compensate for that. At three or 

 four years of age the plants can be transferred to the forest. 

 It is doubtful whether transplanting in the nursery will 

 pay, as the tree does not have a tap-root and has many 

 fibrous ones. Only strengthening the root system would jus- 

 tify it. It is not at all difficult to transplant. Plants can 

 be frequently secured in the forests, where they may be 

 found under the parent trees, and where, unless removed, 

 they will eventually die from want of light. 



The tree is a moderately rapid grower after four or five 

 years of age. In the Southern States, however, it makes a 

 rapid growth from the very first. The tree lives to an old 

 age, and in the forest is seldom seriously affected by in- 

 sects or disease ; but in the open it sometimes is attacked 

 by a species of borer. No information can be obtained of 

 any attempt to grow it for lumber alone, although largely 

 planted as an ornamental tree, but it can be safely as- 

 sumed that it will thrive when set out in proper situations. 



