
The Red Maple is red all over. The tree has red twigs, buds, flowers, and fall leaves.
The Red Maple Tree (Acer rubrum) is a pretty tree. It fills so many roles such as shade, specimen, autumn accent, or on a wet site. It’s easy to establish, grows rapidly and produces brightly colored flowers and fruit, and fall leaf colors (ranging from clear yellow to orange to vivid red). Because of this, it displays coloring during several seasons of the year. See Why Leaves Change Color in Fall.
Red Maple Characteristics
The Red Maple grows faster than both Silver Maple and Box Elder. It is a good choice if you need a tree to grow quickly. Red Maple is a tough plant that can be planted onto many types of disturbed sites in rehabilitation and restoration projects.
The tree doesn’t like other plants growing within its drip line (the outermost reach of the branches). The dense roots make it hard for any other plant to grow.
Male (staminate) trees may grow faster than female ones. Average longevity for red maple is about 80-100 years, but trees are known to reach 200 years of age.
Red Maple’s Role in the Ecosystem
The seeds, buds, and flowers are eaten by various wildlife species. Squirrels and chipmunks store the seeds. White-tailed deer, moose, elk browse the tree’s leaves and buds. And rabbits eat the stump sprouts, especially in fall and winter.
Cavities in red maples in river-floodplain communities are often well suited for cavity nesters such as the wood duck and others.

Attracts: Many insects (bird chick food). The Red Maple sets pollen early in the spring. This early pollen is important to bees and pollinators.
Host Plants to Moths and Butterflies
Host plant to Moths – Ruby Quaker (Orthosia rubescens), Baltimore Bomolocha (Bomolocha baltimoralis), Maple Looper (Parallelia bistriaris), Green-Striped Mapleworm (Dryocampa rubicunda), various Emerald moths and Lesser Maple Spanworm (Itame pustularia). See Caterpillars (Butterfly Life Cycle).
Native Range
Native range: Philadelphia and the Delaware Valley; widely distributed tree in eastern North America, extending from Newfoundland and Nova Scotia west to southern Ontario, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois, then south through Missouri, eastern Oklahoma, and southern Texas, and east to southern Florida.
Natural Habitat
Habitat: The Red Maple is found in bottomlands and it is tolerant of waterlogged soils and flooding. But it is a “super generalist,” growing on the widest variety of sites and in the greatest range of conditions (sunny or shady, high or low nutrients, dry or moist) of any North American species.
Red Maple Facts
Height: up to 60-90 feet (20 m) tall; spreads 30-40 feet
Light needed: sun to shade
Hardiness zones: to zone 3
Bloom period: (February-) March-April, before the vegetative buds, one of the first trees to flower in the spring, fruiting: April-June, before leaf development is complete
Bloom color: pink to dark red
How to Grow a Red Maple
Growing Tips: Red maple is easily transplanted and is one of the easiest trees to grow. A prolific seed producer with trees as young as four years may begin to bear seeds. Good seed crops are usually produced in alternate years. Up to 95% of viable seeds germinate in the first 10 days.

Conclusion
Red Maple is an indigenous tree which gives the northeastern and mid-Atlantic North America our spectacular fall colors. If we want to see brilliant fall color in the future we need to plant the indigenous trees that change their leaf colors as winter approaches.
Related Information
Studying Trees Buds: A Winter Nature Journal Activity
Native Street Trees for Philadelphia and the MidAtlantic
Why Leaves Change Color with a Video
Leaf Colors of Common Trees Here in the Oak-Hickory Forest
Why Trees Drop Their Leaves in the Fall with Video
Fall Foliage Reports – DCNR.org – Fun Fact: 60% of PA is forest.
Beautiful photos. The red is spectacular. Thanks for your inspiration.
You are more than welcome. It’s so warm here in Philly, it doesn’t seems like Fall will never come. The leaves are due to change in 2 weeks!
I mean will ever come!