Box Elder Acer Negundo B&B – All That You Wanted To Know About Maple Ash



Posted: Thursday, November 12, 2009

by Dennis Sons
tn nursery

Maple Ash, Box Elder, Boxelder Maple or scientifically called Acer Negundo is a North American native maple. Termed as American Maple in Russia and Manitoba Maple or Elf Maple in Canada, it is a short lived, fast growing plant, which is usually small with a growth of 10 to 25m in height and 30 to 50cm trunk diameter rarely reaching up to 1m in diameter. It often forms thickets that are impenetrable because of its several trunks. The Box elder is the only maple in North America with a compound leaf. This tree is called Box elder because its whitish wood is considered quite similar to the boxwood, and its pinnate compound leaves are considered similar to some species of elderberry, the genus shrub from the Moschatel family. You can purchase the plant from a nursery , usually available in Ball & Burlap .

The shoots of this tree are green with a violet coating or a pink to whitish waxy coating when it is young. The branches tend to be brittle but smooth and have a green color. The color of the bark is light brown or pale green, which is scaly with broad ridges that have deep clefts. Since the leaves are pinnate compound leaves, they usually have seven to three leaflets. Occasionally, the presences of simple leaves are seen; they are compound single leaflets technically. The Box elder leaflets are 5 to 10cms long and 3 to 7cms wide with margins that are slightly serrate and the color of the leaves are light green translucent which change to yellow during the fall. Each seed which is a paired samara is slender and of 1 to 2cms in length with an incurved wing of 2 to 3cms. The seeds, which are usually fertile and prolific, begin to drop from autumn and may even persist right through winter. Maple Ash is completely dioecious and requires both male and female trees for their reproduction.

The lateral buds are obtuse and terminal buds are acute and are an eighth of an inch in length. When the growth in spring begins, the inner scales begin to enlarge up to an inch in length before falling. In April, the flowers bloom before the leaves with a yellow green colour. The flowers occur in clusters and are staminate with hairy, slender pedicels 1 and 1.5 to 2 inches in length. The Pistillate flowers are narrow and drooping racemes.

The commercial importance of Box Elder is very limited. It can thrive and grow in a variety of climatic conditions. It is drought tolerant though its majorly present in moist soils and areas, often used to break winds around homesteads. It can survive a 30-day inundation. It can grow in heavy clay soils or pure sand but can be commonly seen near streams in alluvial soils. It rarely reachs a life span of 100 years but is commonly known to reach at least 60 years. The tree succumbs to fire and is prone to weeds and bugs.

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