{"id":20224,"date":"2022-10-19T09:00:17","date_gmt":"2022-10-19T13:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/fnr\/extension\/?p=20224"},"modified":"2025-07-29T10:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T14:42:07","slug":"intro-to-trees-of-indiana-silver-maple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/fnr\/extension\/intro-to-trees-of-indiana-silver-maple\/","title":{"rendered":"Intro to Trees of Indiana: Silver Maple"},"content":{"rendered":"

The classic and trusted book “Fifty Common Trees of Indiana” by T.E. Shaw was\u00a0published in 1956 as a user-friendly guide to local species.\u00a0\u00a0Nearly 70 years later, the publication has\u00a0been updated through a joint effort by the Purdue Department of Forestry and Natural Resources,\u00a0Indiana 4-H<\/a>, and\u00a0the\u00a0Indiana Department of Natural Resources<\/a>, and reintroduced as “An Introduction to Trees of Indiana.”<\/p>\n

The\u00a0full publication<\/a>\u00a0is available for download for $7 in the Purdue Extension Education Store. The field guide helps identify common Indiana woodlot trees.<\/p>\n

Each week, the Intro to\u00a0Trees of Indiana web\u00a0series will offer a sneak peek at one species from the book, paired with an\u00a0ID That Tree video from Purdue Extension forester\u00a0Lenny Farlee<\/a>\u00a0to help visualize each species as it stands in the woods.\u00a0Threats to species\u00a0health\u00a0as well as\u00a0also\u00a0insight into the wood provided by the species, will be provided\u00a0through additional resources as well as the\u00a0Hardwoods of the Central Midwest<\/a> exhibit of the Purdue Arboretum, if available.\"Drawing<\/a><\/p>\n

This week, we introduce the silver maple or\u00a0Acer saccharinum.<\/em><\/p>\n

Silver maple has simple, typically five-lobed leaves with deeply cut divisions, or sinuses, between the lobes, with narrow lobes at the base. The leaves, which are silvery on the underside, are held oppositely on long leaf stems coming off the twigs. The bark on young trees is smooth and light gray, and darker and scaly on older trees.<\/p>\n

Silver maple, which is commonly found in swamps and overflow bottomlands, is one of Indiana\u2019s soft maples alongside red maple. It flowers early and sheds its large winged seed in the spring, typically by late May.<\/p>\n

Silver maples, which prefer moist or well-drained soil, grow 50 to 80 feet tall and are found growing from the Great Plains eastward, excluding the Gulf and Atlantic coastal region. Most silver maple lumber is produced in the Mississippi Delta and central states region.<\/p>\n

The Morton Arboretum<\/a>\u00a0warns that without proper and frequent pruning, high winds and ice can cause limbs to break on silver maple trees due to its weak wood and branch structure. These species is also drought sensitive, so be careful to provide supplemental water during dry periods.<\/p>\n