Acer saccharum (Marsh.) is a member of the Aceraceae family and is commonly known as the sugar maple. The sugar maple leaf is the main symbol depicted on the Canadian flag which further emphasizes its importance to Canadian culture and history. Along with it’s cultural significance, it is also extremely important economically in Canada due to the various products that are produced from it’s sap and wood. Due to it’s widespread canopy capable of blocking large amount of sunlight and its gorgeous leaf structure and colourations in the fall, this tree is highly valued as an ornamental and for shade (Sugar Maple, Arbor Day Foundation, 2016). There are nine other Acer species that are native to Canada, of which six major examples include A. glabrum
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saccharum is a forest-grown tree that can grow up to thirty-five metres high and up to ninety centimetres in diameter (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). The sugar maple’s stem structure consists of a straight trunk that is often branch-free for two-thirds or more of its height before opening up into a narrow, round-topped crown, while its root system is often deep and wide-spread in good growing conditions. The maximum life of most sugar maple trees is approximately two-hundred years. The wood of the sugar maple is heavy and hard with a light yellowish-brown colouration. Typically, the wood has a curly grain and is diffuse-porous with easily visible rays. The bark of A. saccharum is a grey colour that is typically smooth at first, and then divides into long, vertical, firm, irregular ridges that curl outward along one side of the trunk (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). Sugar maple twigs are characteristically hairless and shiny with a reddish-brown to greenish colour, and the buds are 6 to 12 millimetres long, medium to dark brown, and are narrowly cone-shaped coming to a sharp point. Typically, these twigs have terminal buds present and each bud is covered with 6-8 pairs of faintly hairy …show more content…
saccharum are extremely unique and special to Canadian national identity. They are between 8 and 20 cm long, simple, oppositely arranged, and palmatifid with typically five (occasionally 3) lobes (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). Borne on petioles that are between 4 and 8 cm long, the leaves are typically wider than long, and the central and lateral lobes of the leaves are separated by wide rounded notches. The central lobe structure is almost square in nature. Leaves have long tips that are bluntly pointed, and the margins will be irregular and coarsely toothed. The lower surface of these leaves is typically glabrous. During the spring and summer, the leaves are yellowish-green on both surfaces, but in the autumn this species displays truly unique and characteristic leaf colourations which can vary from yellow to bright orange to bright red.
Sugar maple flowers are held in drooping, tassel-like lateral cormybs and are typically apetalous with five greenish-yellow sepals (Nesom, 2016). The stalks of these flowers are typically thirty to seventy millimetres in length and are quite slender. This species is dioecious, but only one sex of flower structures will be functional. Typically, floral timing for the sugar maple occurs just before the leaves emerge in the spring (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada,
saccharum is a forest-grown tree that can grow up to thirty-five metres high and up to ninety centimetres in diameter (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). The sugar maple’s stem structure consists of a straight trunk that is often branch-free for two-thirds or more of its height before opening up into a narrow, round-topped crown, while its root system is often deep and wide-spread in good growing conditions. The maximum life of most sugar maple trees is approximately two-hundred years. The wood of the sugar maple is heavy and hard with a light yellowish-brown colouration. Typically, the wood has a curly grain and is diffuse-porous with easily visible rays. The bark of A. saccharum is a grey colour that is typically smooth at first, and then divides into long, vertical, firm, irregular ridges that curl outward along one side of the trunk (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). Sugar maple twigs are characteristically hairless and shiny with a reddish-brown to greenish colour, and the buds are 6 to 12 millimetres long, medium to dark brown, and are narrowly cone-shaped coming to a sharp point. Typically, these twigs have terminal buds present and each bud is covered with 6-8 pairs of faintly hairy …show more content…
saccharum are extremely unique and special to Canadian national identity. They are between 8 and 20 cm long, simple, oppositely arranged, and palmatifid with typically five (occasionally 3) lobes (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada, 2015). Borne on petioles that are between 4 and 8 cm long, the leaves are typically wider than long, and the central and lateral lobes of the leaves are separated by wide rounded notches. The central lobe structure is almost square in nature. Leaves have long tips that are bluntly pointed, and the margins will be irregular and coarsely toothed. The lower surface of these leaves is typically glabrous. During the spring and summer, the leaves are yellowish-green on both surfaces, but in the autumn this species displays truly unique and characteristic leaf colourations which can vary from yellow to bright orange to bright red.
Sugar maple flowers are held in drooping, tassel-like lateral cormybs and are typically apetalous with five greenish-yellow sepals (Nesom, 2016). The stalks of these flowers are typically thirty to seventy millimetres in length and are quite slender. This species is dioecious, but only one sex of flower structures will be functional. Typically, floral timing for the sugar maple occurs just before the leaves emerge in the spring (Sugar maple, Natural Resources Canada,