Montpellier maple

Acer monspessulanum

Family · Sapindaceae · Harmless

The small tough maple of limestone slopes, its leaf with only three rounded lobes, bluish beneath. It turns red and orange in autumn and is one of the few trees in the Peninsula to do so.

Where it grows

Uplands · Oak woods · Streams and ditches

Also known as

French maple

In flower

In fruit

How to tell it

Opposite leaves with three round-tipped lobes, small, leathery and bluish beneath. The fruit is the family's signature: two winged seeds joined at the base, spinning as they fall. Grey bark cracked into small plates. A low tree, often twisted.

What it is confused with

Field maple

Acer campestre

Harmless confusion

Count the leaf lobes: three on Montpellier maple, five on field maple. And the fruit wings spread almost in a straight line on field maple, at a narrower angle on Montpellier maple.

Open sheet →

What it is for

The wood is hard and even-grained and was used for turnery and precision parts. It has no food use. Ecologically it is good news: it indicates well-preserved limestone woodland.

Sources

Flora-On