Acer platanoides L.

Norway maple

Norway maples are native to much of Europe and portions of Asia, though they are now well established in much of the northern US and Canada. They are invasive in some habitats.

Plants: Up to 100′ (30 m) in height. Bark is gray and shallowly grooved, rather than shaggy.

Leaves: Norway maple leaves are opposite and palmate, with sharp tips that become hairlike, while most other maples have more rounded tips. Leaves are 2½–6 ⨉ 3–10″ (7–14 ⨉ 8–25 cm) in size. Leaf stalks (petioles) are 3–8″ (8–20 cm) long. Sugar maples produce clear sap, while a plucked Norway maple leaf exudes a white sap. It is easily distinguished from other maples by its leaf shape. The leaves are typically bright yellow or orange-red in the fall.

Flowers: Corymbs of 15–30, yellow to yellow-green, with five sepals and five petals 1/16–⅛″ (3–4 mm) long. Flowering occurs in early spring before the new leaves emerge.

Fruits: We used to call the seed pods “helicopters,” since they often spun quickly as they fell. They are actually called samaras. Each samara contains two winged seeds that are opposite to each other.

Habitat: Anthropogenic (man-made or disturbed habitats), forest edges, forests, and medium moisture levels.

1. Branchlet with corymb, terminating developing young shoots (a-e) with deciduous (typically green) transitional leaves at their base (k).
2. Branchlet with mature leaves and ripe fruits (double samaras). Stalk exudes a milky sap when broken. Wings of the samaras spread are perpendicular to the pedicels (”horizontally spreading”), with conspicuously flat nutlets.
3. Seedling with cotyledons (c) and first pair of ordinary leaves.
4. Winter-branchlet; buds are reddish-brown, glossy, terminal bud is larger. Leaf-scars are opposite, horseshoe- or heart-shaped and connected extreme [opposite] laterally. After Hempel & Wilhelm, 1889.

My parents are not big fans of this tree, which, until it recently succumbed to a severe ice storm, grew to fill their front yard. It secretes chemicals that discourage the growth of other plants underneath, and creates baby trees by the truckload. In some areas Norway maples are regarded as invasives, though they remain popular as landscape plants and tolerate urban conditions well.

Online References:

Older scientific or horticultural names

Acer platanoides description by Thomas H. Kent, not updated.

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