# sugar maple



## bill not in oh

Is there any sure and easy way to distinguish a sugar maple from the other species of maple? I'd like to tap a couple of trees this winter and would like to be reasonably certain I'm tapping a sugar maple.


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## MELOC

maybe this will help...

http://www.massmaple.org/treeID.html


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## WisJim

You get usable sap from other maples, too, but they may not have as high of sugar content so you need to boil more of it down to make your sirup.


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## seedspreader

Honestly bill, I use almost any maples around here to make syrup.


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## bill not in oh

Okay, I'll go tag 'em before ALL the leaves are gone. Thanks for the replies and the link MELOC


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## haypoint

As you are around them more, you'll begin to recognize Hard Maple (sugar maple) from Soft Maple ( red maple). When the leaves are on, look at the bark on the Sugar Maple compaired to the other maples. Once you learn to identify the Hard Maple from the others by bark, you are all set.


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## Jersey Milker

Hard Maple or sugar maple trees have a relatively rough bark compared to a soft maple as well as the leaves in the fall turn a bright yellow/ orange color where as the soft maple leaves in the fall usually turn red around here where i live. Also the soft maple are more inclined to inhabit low ground around river bottoms and swamps whereas the hard maples are hardly found where there is a lot of water.Soft maple leaves when they are green will have a silver look to them on the underside as well as in the fall when they change. The hard maples will be a dark green on top and bottom. Haypoint is right once you are around them you will easily identify the differences quite easily.


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## MELOC

i have a few sugars along a creek. norway maples have blown in from the neighborhood and grow on the creek bank as well. less than 50 yards away, there is a wet area (sort of) that is all red maple. go uphill about 100 yards away to a swampy/spring fed forested area and there are huge red maples.

the huge red maples have bark that resembles sugar maple bark. norway maples have leaves that resemble sugar maple leaves. sometimes the general area grows whatever blows in. i guess my point is that simetimes it is not as easy as one thinks to ID the trees based on generalizations. i have been trying to ID the seeds this year. what i thought were young sugars along the creek have turned out to be norway maple.

the silver maple is also strange. i think, and i may be wrong, that it is a hard maple. i know it burns well as i cut some of them this spring and burned them earlier this fall. the leaves on those are a dead giveaway. the bark does seem to peel much like the sugars and reds.

add to the mix the possibility that some maples can hybridize naturally. i think the reds can mix with swamp and mountain maple...not totally sure. i know some of the reds were hard to ID via the leaves.

i tapped mostly all red maple last year. it worked out ok. although the sugar content is normally not as good as sugars or blacks, it made good syrup. i also tapped silver maple. the syrup was ok, but like the texts say, it had a lot of sediment. nature has funny way of balancing itself though. the silvers produced sap in great quantities. it nearly ran out of several of the trees i tapped.

i would tap everything you wish and keep the silver maple seperate.


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## Cabin Fever

Take a good look at the Canadian flag....that's a sugar maple leaf on it.


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## MELOC

the graphic representation actually resembles a norway. a sugar maple should have rounded "valleys" between the points toward the center of the leaf.


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## Cabin Fever

Norway maple (left) Sugar maple (right)

From Wikpedia:

*Symbolism*
In 1921, King George V proclaimed the official colours of Canada as red, from the Saint George's Cross, and white, from the French royal emblem since King Charles VII.

As early as 1700, the maple leaf served as a symbol celebrating the nature and environment of what is now Canada. The maple leaf on the flag is a *sugar maple leaf*. Sugar maples are native to Canada and have brilliant fall foliage. The number of points on the leaf has no significance; they do not, for instance, represent the ten provinces plus the federal government. In fact, some of the very first Canadian flags made had maple leaves of 15 points: the lower single points were tripled like the top three.


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## MELOC

pretty common knowledge canada's symbol is the *Sugar Maple*...i just think their artwork needs some help.


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## tinknal

You can also identify maples without leaves. Look at a young branch. New branches always occur 2 at a time, 180 degrees from each other. The next set will be oriented 90% from the previous set. Hope this makes sense.


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## Cabin Fever

MELOC said:


> pretty common knowledge canada's symbol is the *Sugar Maple*...i just think their artwork needs some help.


Good point.....I agree.

I suppose I could Google this, but I really have to go baste the turkey pronto, but around here we have sugar maples and red maples. Are Norway maples the same as red maples? Are Norway maples a native specie to North America?


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## lgslgs

bill in oh said:


> Is there any sure and easy way to distinguish a sugar maple from the other species of maple? I'd like to tap a couple of trees this winter and would like to be reasonably certain I'm tapping a sugar maple.


Around here, it's the one with the most goat tooth prints on the tree trunk. 

Our wether Buster says he'd be happy to label them for you. 

Lynda


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## tinknal

CF, I could be wrong, but I think a red maple IS a sugar maple. I'll have to google maples now.........lol


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## tinknal

tinknal said:


> CF, I could be wrong, but I think a red maple IS a sugar maple. I'll have to google maples now.........lol


Yep.........I'm wrong....................LMBO!

http://www.massmaple.org/treeID.html


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## MELOC

lgslgs said:


> Around here, it's the one with the most goat tooth prints on the tree trunk.
> 
> Our wether Buster says he'd be happy to label them for you.
> 
> Lynda


  goats!?!! they are something else. with the @30 acres of pasture, forest and fencerows available to them, everytime my sister's goats got loose they went straight for the garden or shrubs. then they went to the stone smokehouse and ate the old mortar out of the joints. (i defend my own with a wiffleball bat)

"Find a sugar maple tree. In the winter, this is not quite as easy as it may sound. Sugar maple trees have dark, sharp-tipped buds, that are arranged oppositely (two per node). Look for opposite branching and the characteristic bark. I will show you some sugar maple trees in the field. http://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/naturalresources/DD6286.html You may want to experiment with other species including birch (Betula sp.), silver maple (Acer saccharinum L.), box elder (Acer negundo L.), red maple (Acer rubrum) or Norway maple (Acer platanoides). The latter is rarely used because it produces milky sap. At first glance, basswood (Tilia americana L.) looks like sugar maple but does not produce sap when tapped. Basswood can be recognized by its alternate leaf arrangement (one bud per node), bark and by the numerous sucker shoots that are typically found at the base of the tree. One way to determine if the sap is running is to break off the tip of a small branch. If it "bleeds" the trees are ready to be tapped."


i think norway maples are native to europe. i know they keep tight bark. it doesn't shag like many other native maples. the online info says they can be tapped, but i have never tapped any.


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