“Where you always get the help you need”

Japanese Maples and Ornamental Trees

April 17, 2010

Presented by
Joanne Goodman
CNLP

1051 US Highway Rt. 202, Ringoes NJ, 08551 (908) 788-2600

 Japanese Maples

• Four seasons of beauty

• Spring –new growth foliage provides early season of interesting
colors
• Summer –vibrant colors of leaves persist
• Fall-cooler weather and shorter days often intensifies existing color
or changes color entirely
• Winter- interest in color or texture of tree’s bark. Form is also very
pleasing to us.

Plant needs

• Japanese maples thrive in moist but well drained soil

• Requires slightly acidic soil pH (<7 but >6)
• Light requirements range from full sun, part sun to dense shade
• Ideal is filtered sun
• Cooling period of at least 40 days minimum at temperatures less
than 40 degrees F to be dormant.
• Protect young trees from winter winds, heavy snow and deer.

Japanese Maples in the Landscape

• Very diverse uses for this graceful specimen

• Can be used as a focal point in a lawn area
• Can be used as an accent in a foundation planting
• Can be used along the edge of a wooded or shaded area
• Great tree for rooftop/patio container specimen
 Sizes

• Japanese maples can be kept very small with pruning and are
popular Bonsai specimens.
• Some Japanese maples are able to reach as tall as 40 feet high
and broad with maturity.
• Many Japanese maples are graft grown
• They can be moderate to slow growing

Two main kinds of Japanese maples:

Acer palmatum:

• Most common
• Leaves 1 ½”-3 ½”
• Palm shaped serrated 5-7-lobed leaf
• Upright, tall, and broad 15’-30’
• Weepers 3-4x lateral than vertical height

Acer japonicum:

• Leaves are larger 3”- 4”

• More finely lobed 7-13 lobed leaf
• More rounded shape to leaves
• Large upright varieties grow tall & wide
• Slower growing
 Forms

Upright Varieties:

• Usually as tall as wide at maturity

• Branching habit is lateral
• Faster growers

Weeping Varieties:

• More lateral than vertical in size

• Branching habit is with long arching horizontal branches to the
ground.
• Slower growers

Foliage Shapes

• Palm shape leaves can have 5-13 sharp pointed, divided “lobes”
• Variations of serrated lobes sometimes take on an open “lacey” or
“feathery” look.

Foliage Colors

• Trees are grown for the beauty of their foliage not flowers
• Foliage can be many different colors:

Dark green, Bright red, Variegated, Deep red, Brilliant orange, red,
purple, and yellow colors.
 Hardiness

• Hardy to zones 5 & 6

(our zone is ideal!)
• Very tough, disease
resistant
• Durable long lasting tree,
despite the myth that
they are “fragile and
brittle” in old age.
• Lives under black walnut
and butternut species
successfully tolerating
jugolone.

Care and Maintenance:

• Rarely needs pruning

• Prune in early spring-late
winter months when
dormant
• Selectively prune
branched for a desired
shape, “open up” tree or
to keep weeping
branches off the ground.
• Remove winter dieback
(whitish/gray branches)
in spring or anytime of
the year to stimulate
new growth.
 • Consult with a
Collecting and Growing professional nurseryman
Ornamentals: for the best advice.

• Why grow ornamentals?

They are truly rare and
uniquely beautiful in the
landscape and can also
increase your property
value with age.

• Ornamentals
enhance/compliment
their surroundings and
are a long term
investment in the
landscape.
• They often can provide:
• Shade= energy savings
• Habitat for wildlife
• A visual conversation
piece

Choosing ornamentals

• Examine the overall

landscape area.
• Ask yourself what the
existing trees /shrubs
look like during each
season.
• Choose a size, shape and
form that will
compliment the current
features.
• Determine the conditions
sun, shade, wind, deer,
soil conditions, etc that
the specimen will be
planted.
 Deciduous

Evergreens: Dogwoods:
All-Wolf Eyes,Kousa,Native
Pines: Pink,Kousa
Vanderwolf Flex Maples:
Thunderhead All -Japanese Varieties
Japanese White Trident
Weeping White Paperbark
Dragon Eye Beeches:
Spruces: Weeping Purple
Blue Totem Weeping Green
Mission Blue Purple Fountain
Montgomery Blue Red Obelisk
Little Gem Tricolor
Weeping Norway Birches:
Weeping White European White
Froberg River
Dwarf Alberta White Himalayan
Cypress: Others:
Hinoki Japanese Stewartia
Blue Ice Lilac Tree
Golden Hinoki Princeton Elm
Dwarf Hinoki Sourwood Tree
False Cypress Chaste
Itallian Dawn Redwood
Wells Hinoki Parrotia
Cedars: Black Gum
Weeping Blue Atlas Winterking Hawthorn
Blue Atlas Pyramidal Hornbeam
Deodor Purple Robed Locust
Kashmir Deodor Lavendar Twist Redbud
Hollies: Golden Rain
Mary Nell Katsura
Honey Maid Harry Lauders Walking stick
Dragon Lady Crimson Pointe Plum
Nellie Stevens Weeping Decid Larch
Japanese Snowbell
Magnolias:
SweetBay