Rocky Mountain Maple
Acer glabrum
Rocky Mountain maple is a graceful multi-stemmed small maple of western mountain canyons and streamsides, with reddish twigs and clear yellow fall color. Tough and cold-hardy for high-elevation gardens. Young shoots, fresh or dried, are eaten like asparagus, and the seeds are boiled once the wings are removed; the inner bark has served as a famine-food flour.
- Family
- Sapindaceae
- Type
- tree
- Lifespan
- perennial
- Height
- 30–30 ft
- Spacing
- 10–20 ft apart
- Light
- sun, part shade
- Soil moisture
- moist
- Soil pH
- acidic, neutral
- Bloom
- April, May
- Bloom colors
- yellow, green
- Wildlife value
- butterflies, pollinators, mammals, songbirds, larval host
- Caterpillar hosts
- ~297 butterfly & moth species
- Landscape uses
- specimen, hedge or screen
- Native states
- AK, AZ, CA, CO, ID, MT, NE, NM, NV, OR, SD, UT, WA, WY
Related native plants
More Acer species
- Red Maple (Acer rubrum)
- Silver Maple (Acer saccharinum)
- Boxelder (Acer negundo)
- Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum)
- Bigleaf Maple (Acer macrophyllum)
- Striped Maple (Acer pensylvanicum)