PARK AND CEMETERY. 
288 
THe BlacK Maple. 
By Wilfred A. Brotherton. 
The various species of ]\Iaple have long been fa- 
vorites as shade trees. We hear very much about the 
Sugar Maple, White Maple, Red Maple, and about the 
various European and Japanese Maples, but I do not 
remember of ever seeing any notice of the Black 
Maple in either paper or magazine. Exceedingly few 
nurserymen handle them, the people as a rule knowing 
nothing about them, especially eastern people. 
This is a strange fact, for the Black Maple (Acer 
nigrum) is the handsomest of all our native American 
Maples, and by far the best for a shade tree. In the 
highlands of Oakland County, IMich., this beautiful 
tree reaches its greatest perfection. i\Iany fine ones 
have been planted for shade trees at Rochester, Mich. 
Planted side by side with the Sugar Maple, it is 
in every respect much its superior as an ornamental 
shade tree, always smaller, however. The cut illus- 
trating this article gives a good idea of the general out- 
line of the tree, it being almost universally oval or 
ovate in outline, the branches as a rule, being much 
shorter than those of the Sugar Maple, more ascend- 
ing and denser in growth. A Black Maple tree with 
wide-spread branches is seldom or never found. 
The trunk of the tree varies much in color, gray, 
ashy, or very often clear black, or gray and black. 
The leaves of this species are very large, often double 
the size of those of the Sugar Maple, often 6 to 8 
inches long and nearly as wide, always more or less 
hairy above, green and densely woolly beneath the 
leafstalks, the green young branches also being thicker 
than those of Sugar Maple and very woolly. The color 
of these very large leaves is a very dark rich green, 
of much darker shade than any other maple I have 
ever seen. The base of the leaf is very unlike that of 
other maples, the sinus being closed, and the base ex- 
tending much lower on the leafstalk than in Sugar 
Maple leaves. 
As seen with the afternoon sun shining full upon it. 
a tree of this species is indeed a beautiful sight, espe- 
cially if a light breeze stirs those great rich dark green 
leaves. No one can see such a tree in its full per- 
fection of large dense foliage, without agreeing with 
me that it surpasses all other maples, whether native 
or European, as an ornamental and useful shade tree. 
It may grow slower than the Sugar Maple, and prob- 
ably never grows so large as that species, and, of 
course, not as large as the White Maple — in Michigan 
our largest native maple — nor quite so rapidly as the 
ACER NIGRUM. 
Norway Maple, but it certainly surpasses them all in 
beauty of form and richness of foliage. In autumn the 
leaves become a rich yellow. 
Opinions differ as to its value as a maple sugar 
producer, but I believe it does not yield as much as 
Sugar Maple and, therefore, ranks below it as a sugar 
producer. The wood is probably denser and heavier 
than that of Sugar Maple and makes as good timber 
and fuel as that species. Its beauty demands that it 
should be planted in preference to all other maples. 
