The Red or Swamp Maple— Acer rubrum 
T he Red Maple is happily so named: 
at almost any season it displays some 
token to justify the adjective. In winter it 
is the hark of the twigs; in spring the blos¬ 
soms; in summer the key-truits, while in 
autumn 
“The Maple .swamps glow like a sunset sea, 
Each leaf a ripple with its separate Rush.” , 
The species is easily distinguished from 
its allies. T he leaves have the sinuses acute 
rather than rounded. The flowers are on 
short stalks and the small key-fruits on long 
stalks that arise from a common base. T he 
young trees have a smooth, distinctive light 
gray hark while the old trees have the dark 
gray hark separated into many long scale 
like plates. T he wood is less valuable than 
that of the Sugar Maple, hut it is largely 
used for making chairs and other kinds of 
furniture. 
In many respects the Red Maple is the 
most conspicuous tree in our landscape. 
In winter the red twigs often shine in the sun¬ 
light, while in earliest spring the deep crim¬ 
son blossoms so thickly clothe the leafless 
branches that the trees challenge the atten¬ 
tion of the most listless observer. A few 
weeks later when the blossoms have developed 
into fruits the latter are so deeply crimson 
that they give color to the landscape just 
come into the leafy greenness of June. T he 
terminal leaves on the younger growth are 
commonly crimson through the summer 
and in earliest autumn the whole foliage 
becomes so brilliant as to he the dominant 
tone of the lower valleys. 
The Red Maple is also commonly called 
the Scarlet Maple, Swamp Maple and Soft 
Maple. It is a lowland tree, being espec¬ 
ially found in swamps and along river-hanks, 
and is widely distributed through eastern 
North America, occurring both north and 
south as far west as Iowa and T exas. Pro¬ 
fessor Sargent states that the largest trees are 
found in the valley of the Ohio river and its 
tributaries. 
