Maple Trees Make Great Landscape Trees

Last weekend while playing Scrabble with my family, I tried to play the word “Acer.” I was challenged and lost. I can’t believe Acer wasn’t in our dictionary!

Acer is, of course, the scientific name for maple. Worldwide there are about 200 different types of maples. They grow as trees and sometimes shrubs and are native mainly to the northern temperate regions. The five species of maples that are native to Illinois are sugar maple, silver maple, red maple, black maple, and boxelder.

Boxelder and silver maple are not usually recommended for landscape use. Boxelder is a very weak and trashy tree. Silver maple, though fast growing and large, is also weak wooded and easily broken by wind and ice. Still, I really like both trees in their natural habitats.

Sugar and red maple are commonly used and great for most landscapes. Sugar maple (Acer saccharum) is one of the slowest growing trees, yet hardest wood.  It has variable fall color, but often shows the most intense orange and reds. This is a very drought tolerant tree and does well in most situations.

'October Glory' Red Maple

Red maple (Acer rubrum) is a bit smaller than the sugar maple, reaching 40-50 feet instead of 80 feet tall. This tree has intense, brilliant red fall colors.  The leaves are green during summer, with red stems.  Red maples have gray-tan bark when young.  This is such a popular tree that many cultivars are available. I have an October Glory red maple in my front yard that almost always has spectacular orange fall color. Purchase trees in fall to determine the color. By the way, the maples that have deep purple colored leaves all summer long are nonnative ‘Crimson King’ Norway maples, not red maples.

I highly recommend two smaller, non-native maples for landscape use: Amur and Paperbark maples. The smaller size of these trees better fits many small home yards. Amur maple (Acer ginnala) is a multi-stemmed tree that grows 15 feet by 15 feet in size. It makes a nice patio tree or can be used singularly. I have also seen it used nicely as a hedge. This tree has brilliant orange/red fall color.

Paperbark Maple's beautiful bark
at ICC Gardens in E. Peoria

Probably my favorite small maple is the Paperbark maple (Acer griseum). It grows as a single or multi-stem plant, reaching 20 feet by 20 feet in size. This plant has so many great features that it is hard to list them all. Most outstanding is its exfoliating cinnamon-brown bark that separates into thin, papery flakes. It has a trifoliate (3-part) leaf that is quite unique. The leaves are dark green-blue in the summer, changing to a muted to brilliant red in the fall. Paperbark maple is just a great overall landscape tree. Mine grows in my backyard where I can see it in every season.

Next time I play scrabble I’m going to use my botanical terms dictionary.