Maple

Acer (maple) is a genus of trees or shrubs. They are variously classified in a family of their own, the Aceraceae, or (together with the Hippocastanaceae) included in the family Sapindaceae. more...

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Modern classifications, including the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group classification, favour inclusion in Sapindaceae. There are approximately 125 species, most of which are native to Asia, but several species also occur in Europe, northern Africa, and North America.

The word Acer is derived from a Latin word meaning "sharp" (referring to the characteristic points on the leaves) and was first applied to the genus by the French botanist Joseph Pitton de Tournefort in 1700. The type species of the genus is Acer pseudoplatanus (Sycamore Maple).

Morphology

Maples are mostly trees growing to 10-40 metres (30-130 ft) in height. Others are shrubs less than 10 metres tall with a number of small trunks originating at ground level. Most species are deciduous, but a few in southern Asia and the Mediterranean region are evergreen. Most are shade-tolerant when young, and are often late-successional in ecology; many of the smaller species are usually understory trees growing under the canopies of other larger trees, while the larger species eventually become dominant canopy trees. Maple root systems are typically dense and fibrous. A few species, notably Acer cappadocicum, frequently produce root sprouts, which can develop into clonal colonies.

Maples are distinguished by opposite leaf arrangement. The leaves in most species are palmate veined and lobed, with 3-9 (rarely to 13) veins each leading to a lobe, one of which is central or apical. A small number of species differ in having palmate compound, pinnate compound, pinnate veined or unlobed leaves. Several species, including Acer griseum (Paperbark Maple), Acer mandshuricum (Manchurian Maple), Acer maximowiczianum (Nikko Maple), and Acer triflorum (Three-flowered Maple), have trifoliate leaves. One species, Acer negundo (Manitoba Maple), has pinnately compound leaves that may be simply trifoliate or may have five, seven, or rarely nine leaflets. A few, such as Acer laevigatum and Acer carpinifolium (Hornbeam Maple), have pinnately-veined simple leaves.

The flowers are regular, pentamerous, and borne in racemes, corymbs, or umbels. They have four or five sepals, four or five petals about 1–6 mm long (absent in some species), four to ten stamens about 6-10 mm long, and two pistils or a pistil with two styles. The ovary is superior and has two carpels, whose wings elongate the flowers, making it easy to tell which flowers are female. Maples flower in late winter or early spring, in most species with or just after the leaves appear, but in some before them.

Read more at Wikipedia.org