Acer glabrum
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Acer glabrum |
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A. glabrum subsp. douglasii, Willamette National Forest
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Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||
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Acer glabrum Torr. |
Acer glabrum (English:Douglas Maple) is a maple native to western North America, from southeastern Alaska, British Columbia and western Alberta, east to western Nebraska, and south through Washington, Montana and Colorado to California, Arizona and New Mexico.
It is so plentiful in many parts of the Rocky Mountains that it is often called the Rocky Mountain Maple; it is also sometimes known as Rock Maple. It often grows with Ponderosa pine, Douglas-fir, and trembling aspen.
It is a deciduous shrub or small tree growing to 10 m tall, with a trunk up to 20-30 cm diameter. The leaves are 2-10 cm broad, three-lobed (rarely five-lobed), variable in the depth of lobing, occasionally so deeply lobed as to be divided into three leaflets; the lobes have an acute apex and a coarsely serrated margin. The flowers are produced in corymbs of five to ten, yellowish-green, at the same time as the new leaves in spring. The fruit is a samara with two winged seeds.
There are four to six subspecies, treated by some authors at the lower rank of variety:
- Acer glabrum subsp. glabrum – Rocky Mts, Montana to New Mexico
- Acer glabrum subsp. diffusum – eastern California, Nevada, Utah
- Acer glabrum subsp. douglasii – Alaska south to Washington and Idaho
- Acer glabrum subsp. greenei – central California
- Acer glabrum subsp. neomexicanum – New Mexico
- Acer glabrum subsp. torreyi – northern California