THE MAPLES 



A hole is bored in the trunk of the tree, 

 and the sap flows for about three weeks. It 

 is collected daily in buckets, and then boiled 

 into syrup. A sugar maple should not be 

 tapped before it is twenty-five or thirty years 

 old, but after that age it may be tapped an- 

 nually as long as it lives. The wood of this 

 tree is hard and smooth, and is much used for 

 furniture and the interior finishing of houses. 

 Occasionally a tree is found where the fibres 

 of the wood are contorted irregularly into 

 round points called bird's eyes. The cause of 

 this peculiar bird's-eye maple is unknown, and 

 the theory that the grain is diverted by the tap- 

 ping of woodpeckers for the sweet sap is an 

 unsatisfactory explanation, for some trees are 

 thickly covered, while others do. not have a 

 single spot. 



The Latin name, Acer saccharum sugar 

 maple came from the Arabic, Soukar. 



Red or Swamp A low tree > with a rounded head, 



Maple smooth gray bark, reddish twigs 



Acer rubrum ao tted with brown, and small, 



round red buds with smooth scales. When old 



the bark cracks and peels off in long, slender 



flakes. Small leaf -scars opposite each other on the 



stem. The flowers come before the leaves, from 



the round flower buds clustered around the stem. 



