Posted by
ILPARW (southeast Pennsylvania - Zone 6b) on Feb 8, 2018 10:48 AM concerning plant:
The Norway Maple is native to most of Europe. It was brought over to North America during colonization. It is a very common tree in the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and Midwestern US that is still sold by most all conventional nurseries, along with a few cultivars with red-purple foliage all growing season. It is a good quality hard maple. I grew up in the 1950's into the 70's looking at an excellent specimen about 35 feet high in a narrow parkway across the street from my parents' house in northeast IL. However, when Asplendh came along in the 1980's, they butchered it horribly as telephone wires went through the crown. It was gone about 2010, probably having been planted about 1920. The 5-lobed leaves of Norway Maple are large (to 7 inches across), dark, and leathery. The yellow flower clusters bloom in April. The bark is brown and furrowed. The buds are plump, rounded, and mostly maroon with a little green in color. It produces lots of large samara seeds about 2 inches long in early fall. It grows about 1.5 feet/year or a little more and lives 100 to 200 years, though many in tough landscape conditions don't live that long. Unfortunately, Norway Maple has escaped cultivation and is an invasive tree in forest and also is a weed tree in waste places. It is very similar to the Sycamore Maple from Europe that has differently shaped leaves. (It looks similar to the Sugar Maple. The latter species is a higher quality hard maple with much better autumn color. Sugar Maple has brown-gray bark that is plated, has small, sharp brown buds, and has smaller, lighter leaves with less points, and is not as tough to difficult conditions of pollution, salt, or restricted space.) Norway Maple is a good urban tree.
