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Acer truncatum Bunge

Modern name

Acer truncatum Bunge

Synonyms

A. cappadocicum subsp. truncatum (Bunge) E. Murray

A small, deciduous tree up to 25 ft in height; branchlets glabrous, often tinged with purple when young. Leaves five-occasionally seven-lobed, 212 to 412 in. wide, less in length, dark green above, paler below; glabrous on both surfaces; truncate or somewhat heart-shaped at the base; the lobes triangular; the two basal ones out-spreading, the three terminal ones often furnished with two large teeth; leaf-stalk containing milky juice. Flowers 13 to 12 in. across, greenish yellow, each on a slender stalk 12 in. long, borne in erect, branching corymbs 3 in. wide. Fruits glabrous; wings 114 to 112 in. long, 13 to 12 in. wide, about half as long again as the nutlet, the pair forming an angle of about 90°.

Native of N. China, whence seed collected in the autumn of 1881 were sent by Dr Bretschneider to Kew, and germinated in the spring of the following year. It is allied to A. mono, but differs in the truncate base of the leaf, and in the larger flowers. It grows well and is quite hardy at Kew. In the maple collection at Birr Castle, Co. Offaly, Eire, it is 40 × 3 ft (1966).



From the Supplement (Vol. V)

specimens: Kew, pl. 1935, 35 × 334 ft (1981); Borde Hill, Sussex, 38 × 312 ft (1977); Talbot Manor, Norfolk, pl. 1948, 28 × 3 ft (1978); Thorp Perrow, Bedale, Yorks., 46 × 234 ft (1981); Bodnant, Gwyn., 40 × 414 ft (1981); Birr Castle, Co. Offaly, Eire, 52 × 5 ft (1985).

† cv. ‘Akikaze Nishiki’ (‘Shuhu Nishiki’). – Leaves rich green, marked with white, some wholly white, some merely stippled with it (Vertrees, op. cit., p. 160). It is grown in the Mallet Court collection and in the Hillier Arboretum.

Genus

Acer

Other species in the genus