False Siebold maple

Maple family. Found in Primorye, Northeast China and Korea.

A small graceful tree up to 8 m tall, with a dense pyramidal, irregular crown. The trunk bark is light gray; on young shoots it is reddish or greenish, with a bluish bloom. Buds are small, reddish. The leaves of this maple are very attractive. Rounded, palmate or cut to half the blade, nine-lobed, up to 10 cm in diameter. Lobes are broadly rhombic or triangular, at first pubescent on both sides, later glabrous. The bright green blade turns red-pink or mauve-red in autumn. Flowers are rather large, yellowish-white with large purple sepals almost twice the size of the petals, grouped 10-20 in racemose inflorescences with pubescent axes. It blooms after leaf unfolding for 10-15 days. Samaras are pinkish-red at the beginning of ripening and only later become yellowish-brown.

Easy to transplant. Tolerates urban conditions. Fairly winter-hardy. Shade-tolerant. Develops normally only on well-drained soils. One of the most ornamental maple species. Very beautiful in spring, when the bright pink-red protective scales of the leaf buds have not yet fallen and the newly emerged rolled young leaves are visible, but especially fine in the autumn period, when the leaves, changing their range of tones, acquire a fiery red coloration that as a whole creates the illusion of a blazing fire. It is also attractive during the flowering period, when white-and-red inflorescences hang from beneath the horizontally spread leaves on long dark-red petioles. The slenderness and beauty of this species make it a desirable park plant. Recommended for solitary or loose group plantings, as well as for creating compositional groups.