How To Tell A Maple Tree In The Winter

Simple leaves like a maples are individual and need only the support of delicate twigs. Now get out those snowshoes and see how many maples you can find. Maple red maple trees have smooth gray bark that breaks into irregular fissures as the tree ages.

In winter identification branches bark and buds are the most helpful elements to identify these maple trees.

How to tell a maple tree in the winter. Strips of bark often begin to detach from either end and curl outward. Maples have a distinct opposite branching in which the twigs and branches grow out from the limbs on opposite sides. Discern the maples from most other species by carefully studying the branching pattern. Compound leaves grow in dense clusters of leaflets and require robust twigs for support.

To identify maple trees in the wintertime you must rely on the branches bark and other features of the tree to help you. The red maple has red winter buds. An ash leaf for example usually consists of 5 to 11 leaflets. To identify a maple tree in the winter you have to confirm opposite branching and paired buds and then look at the bark to rule out the ash and flowering dogwood.

Leaves offer clues even in their absence. Sooner than you know it the days will be above freezing and the sap will be flowing. Silver maples have dense bud clusters. M aples have an opposite branching pattern as do a sh d ogwood and buck eye trees.