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Red Maple

Acer rubrum

Red maple is one of the first trees to color the spring woods, opening dense clusters of small red flowers on bare gray twigs weeks before any leaf appears. It is the most adaptable of the eastern maples, equally at home along a swamp margin and on a dry upland slope, which is why it has spread so widely through disturbed and cut-over land. Few trees anywhere on the continent feed more species of native caterpillar, and that in turn is what fills a red maple with warblers in May. Fall color runs from clear yellow through orange to deep scarlet, often several shades on one tree. Like sugar maple the sap can be tapped and boiled into syrup, though the yield is roughly half; the inner bark was also dried and ground into a meal.

Family

Sapindaceae

Type

tree

Lifespan

perennial

Height

40–70 ft

Spacing

30–50 ft apart

Light

sun, part shade

Soil moisture

moist

Soil pH

acidic, neutral

Bloom

March, April

Bloom colors

red, yellow

Wildlife value

songbirds, larval host

Caterpillar hosts

~297 butterfly & moth species

Landscape uses

rain garden

Native states

AL, AR, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, IA, IL, IN, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, NC, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OK, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, VA, VT, WI, WV