( 139) 



that flower before the leaves develop, and from the former 

 the red maple may be distinguished by its stalked flowers. 

 The fruits are also red, and the foliage turns bright red in 

 the autumn, so the tree is well-named. 



Throughout the eastern states the tree is common and in 

 the Hudson Valley it may be found in great quantity. Its 

 wood is largely used in the manufacture of furniture. 

 Scarlet maple and swamp maple are names often used for 

 this tree. 



Sugar Maple Acer saccharum 



Maple sugar and maple syrup have made this the most 

 widely known of all our native maples. It rarely exceeds 

 120 feet in height, and when perfectly developed it has a 

 great dome-like crown. The brown channelled bark of the 

 old trunk does not split off in plates. The leaf-blades are 

 roundish in outline, 3- or 5-lobed and sometimes as wide as 

 6 inches across the broadest part. On the upper surface they 

 are dark green, on the lower paler or even bluish-green. 

 Unlike the two preceding kinds the flowers of the sugar 

 maple do not come out until the foliage is well developed. 

 They are greenish-yellow and very conspicuous. The wings 

 of the " key " fruits are almost parallel and strongly veined. 

 The tree is confined to the region east of the Mississippi 

 and its tributaries, and is common in the Hudson Valley 

 particularly northward. The wood is valuable for decora- 

 tive finishing of all kinds, and the tree may be annually 

 tapped for its sap, from which maple syrup and sugar are 

 made. From 12 to 13 quarts a year per tree is an average 

 yield of syrup. (Plate 147.) 



Black Maple Acer nigrum 



In some localities this tree seems to usurp the place of the 

 sugar maple, to which it is very closely allied. In the Hud- 

 son Valley the black maple is rare and local. It frequently 

 attains the same stature as the sugar maple and its flowers 

 and fruits are very similar to those of the better known tree. 



