Trees Worth Knowing Part 25

In winter the lover of the woods, re-visiting the scenes of his summer rambles, knows the scarlet maple by the knotty, full-budded twigs which gleam like red-hot needles set with coral beads, against the clean-limbed, gray-trunked tree. The red maple never quite forgets its name.

As a street tree, it makes rapid progress when it once becomes established, though it is apt to stand still for a time after being transplanted. Its branches are short, numerous, and erect, making a round head, admirably adapted to the resistance of heavy winds. It is particularly suited to use in narrow streets.

=The Soft Maple=

_A. saccharinum_, Linn.

The soft maple or silver maple (_see ill.u.s.tration, page 199_) has a white-lined leaf, cleft almost to the midrib and each division again deeply cut. It is quick and ready to grow, and has been widely planted as a street tree, especially in prairie regions of uncertain rainfall. It is one of the poorest of trees for street planting, because it has a sprawling habit and weak brittle wood. The heavy limbs have great horizontal spread, and are easily broken by ice and windstorms. When planted on streets, they require constant cutting back to make them even safe. Thick crops of suckers rise from the stubs of branches, but the top thus formed is neither beautiful nor useful.

Wier's weeping maple, a cut-leaved, drooping variety of this silver maple, is often seen as a lawn tree, imitating the habit of the weeping willow.

=The Oregon Maple=

_A. macrophyllum_, Pursh.

The Oregon maple grows from southern Alaska to Lower California, along the banks of streams. The great leaves, often a foot in diameter, on blades of equal length, are the distinguishing marks of this stout-limbed tree, that grows in favorable soil to a height of a hundred feet. In southern Oregon it forms pure forest, its huge limbs forming magnificent, interlacing arches that shut out the sun and make a wonderful cover for ferns and mosses far below. The wood of this tree is the best hard-wood lumber on the West Coast.

=The Vine Maple=

_A. circinatum_, Pursh.

The vine maple reminds one of the lianas of tropical woods, for it has not sufficient stiffness to stand erect. It grows in the bottom lands and up the mountain sides, but always following watercourses, from British Columbia to northern California. Its vine-like stems spring up in cl.u.s.ters from the ground, spreading in wide curves, and these send out long, slender twigs which root when they touch the ground, thus forming impenetrable thickets, often many acres in extent.

The leaf is almost circular and cut into narrow equal lobes around the margin; green in midsummer, it changes to red and gold in autumn, and the woodsman, almost worn out with the labor of getting through the maze these trees form, must delight, when he stops to rest, in the autumn glory of this wonderful ground cover.

These little maples lend a wonderful charm to the edges of forest highways in the Eastern states. Like the hornbeams, hazel bushes, and ground hemlock, they are lovers of the shade; and they fringe the forest with a shrubbery border.

=The Striped Maple=

_A. Pennsylvanic.u.m_, Linn.

The striped maple is quickly recognized by the pale white lines that streak in delicate patterns the smooth green bark of the branches.

The leaves are large and finely saw-toothed, with three triangular lobes at the top. The yellowish bell-flowers hang in drooping cl.u.s.ters, followed by the smooth green keys, in midsummer. This tree is called "Moosewood," for moose browse upon it.

The shrubbery border of parks is lightened in autumn by the yellow foliage of this little tree, and in winter the bark is very attractive. "Whistlewood" is the name the boys know this tree by, for in spring the bark slips easily, and they cut branches of suitable size for whistles.

=The Mountain Maple=

_A. spicatum_, Lam.

The mountain maple is a dainty shrub with ruddy stems, large, three-lobed leaves, erect cl.u.s.ters of yellow flowers and tiny brown keys. It follows the mountains from New England to northern Georgia, and from the Great Lakes extends to the Saskatchewan.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _See page 180_ _See page 178_

THE Th.o.r.n.y TRUNK OF THE HONEY LOCUST, AND THE FOLIAGE AND FLOWERS OF THE BLACK LOCUST]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _See page 194_

SUGAR MAPLE

Maple sugar is made in February; the trees bloom in May; their seeds ripen in October]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _See page 195_

THE RED MAPLE'S PISTILLATE (_left_) AND STAMINATE (_right_) FLOWERS]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _See page 196_

SEED KEYS AND NEW FOLIAGE OF THE SOFT OR SILVER MAPLE]

=The Dwarf Maple=

_A. glabrum_, Torr.

The dwarf maple ranges plentifully from Canada to Arizona and New Mexico. Its leaves, typically three-lobed and cut-toothed, vary to a compound form of three coa.r.s.e-toothed leaflets. The winged keys are ruddy in midsummer, lending an attractive dash of color to the woods that border high mountain streams.

Very common in cultivation are the j.a.panese maples--miniature trees, bred and cultivated for centuries, wonderful in the variations in form and coloring of their leaves. Tiny maple trees in pots are often very old. Some leaves are mere skeletons.

The j.a.panese people are worshippers of beauty and they delight particularly in garden shows. In the autumn, when the maples have reached perfection, the populace turns out in holiday attire to celebrate a grand national fete. A sort of aesthetic jubilee it is, like the spring jubilee of the cherry blossom. To each careful gardener who has patiently toiled to bring his maples to perfection, it is sufficient reward that the people make this annual pilgrimage to view them.

=The Box Elder=

_A. Negundo_, Linn.

The box elder is the one maple whose leaves are always cleft to the stem, making it compound of irregularly toothed leaflets. The cl.u.s.ters of flattened keys, which hang all winter on the trees, declare the kinship of this tree to the maples.

Fast-growing, hardy, willing to grow in treeless regions, this tree has spread from its eastern range throughout the plains, where shelter belts were the first needs of the settlers. Pretty at first, these box elders are soon broken down and unsightly. They should be used only as temporary trees, alternating with elms, hard maples, and ashes. Where they are neglected, or continue to be planted, the character of the town or the premises must be cheap and ugly.

=The Norway Maple=

_A. platanoides_, Linn.

The Norway maple is counted the best maple we have for street planting. Broad, thin leaves, three-lobed by wide sinuses, cover with a thick thatch the rounded head of the tree. Green on both sides, thin and smooth, these leaves seem to withstand remarkably the smoke, soot, and dust of cities, and also the attacks of insects. The keys are large, wide-winged, set opposite, the nutlets meeting in a straight line. These pale green key cl.u.s.ters are very handsome among the green leaves in summer--the tree's chief ornament until the foliage ma.s.s turns yellow in autumn. A peculiarity of the Norway maple is the milky juice that starts from a broken leaf-stem.

=The Sycamore Maple=

_A. pseudo-plata.n.u.s_, Linn.

The sycamore maple is another European immigrant, whose broad leaf is thick and leathery in texture, and pale underneath. Its late-opening flowers are borne in long racemes, followed by the small key fruits which cling to the twigs over winter, making the tree look dingy and untidy. This tree has not the hardiness nor the compact form of the Norway maple, and it is subject to the attack of borers.