Northeast Gardening: cold-stratified sugar maple seeds, 0 by Resin

Resin wrote:
I'd go for doing your own collection - I did it (with Acer pseudoplatanus, A. cappadocicum and A. platanoides) for someone on another forum who suddenly wanted seeds in early March.

Acer saccharum seeds are easy to recognise, nearly spherical, about 5-8mm diameter, with either the whole wing still remaining or a stub of it (quite often, the thin part of the wing will have rotted away by now). They are very easy to tell from Acer platanoides (a common invasive alien in N America) as A. platanoides seeds are flat discs, not globular. Pic of a pair of fresh seeds below from USDA.

Quite likely by now, a lot of the seeds will have already started germinating; look for two bright green strap-shaped cotyledons, rolled up when they first emerge from the seed husk.

Most of the seeds will be underneath the crown of the trees or within 5m of the downwind margin, they don't generally blow very far. I was finding up to 5-10 seeds per 10cm x 10cm area, no trouble at all to pick up 50.

Resin


This message was edited Mar 27, 2007 10:28 AM