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Mac, I know in VT when cleared land is left to return to forest on its own, often the maples are one of the dominant trees early on. Good for sugar in a generation or so, bad for the wildlife here. Not enough nut trees, etc. Wouldn't surprise me if you're dealing with wild maples in former farmlands or such.
LOL Thanks Mac but the trees seem to be purty smart...they haven't thrown down a single limb onto the roof, and always seem to know when there'll be rain. Freezing nights aren't a problem, neither are sunny days, but the "still" part might be a problem... we have almost constant wind here. The fall leaves are a particularly stunning gold color; they almost glow in the dark.
OK, I'll look at em more closely.. The only reason I am sure about the age is that the house was built 100 years ago, by a neighbor's great-grampa. He didn't plant the trees until great grandson was a teen. By the time grandson came along, he was crawling out the upstairs BR window, jumpng over, and skinning down the then-slender trunk. When son came along, he could barely leap onto the branches from the window, the branches were so big; he had to slide onto them from the 1st floor verandah roof. One nice thing about buyng an old house in a neighborhood where no one leaves is that the whole family will come by eventually and tell you the stories about when.
As for the box elders, they were all wiped out here about 10 years ago by the box elder bugs. Go figure - every spring we have still more box elder bugs, but no trees. We have mostly real cottonwoods, hawthorn, and cedar, although the last owner stuck a poplar in the middle of nothing, and then a loblolly 10 feet away, with a dwarf apple 100 feet away. She was great for what the horticulturists call "specimen planting" - one of something all by itself. Me, I figure if you put in one, then 3 or maybe 10 are better. It'll take me at least 10 years to get the trees, bushes, and flowers all either lined up or grouped together so they don't look so frightened and alone.
Artic, yeah probably. The area wasn't like where I live. The area was likey a pasture once, cut over a probably 3 times since the 1600's too, but not wasted like the Fair Ground was.
Once cut over there it went to grasses, once that idea ended I guess poplars would hav e come up with some swamp birch, and then mixed woods came to be mostly maples which more or less works.
The fair ground was stripped of top soil, so moss took over, a smattering of poplar. swamp birch paper birch but white pine wiped most of that out, and with the ground covering moss.
At this point where it's still abandoned land the white pines are so over crowded it looks like this.
A couple hundred feet away, just off the old fair ground it looks like this.
SCG, I would be still curious to see a close up of one leaf, and a test about now or soon of one tap, or even a scrap if you can get to a clean limb with out 2 inches of bark somehow.
Not very far from here maybe 6 miles mostly west is a place in the national Forest that was once King George's 'Mast Road'. Just the trail of it is left now. In Northern Maine I have seen one tree with the arrow marking left. It is a section of a mast tree, and under a shed roof now.
LOL and all around heya' are older homes with more than 20 inch wide boards in floors and on knee wall factia which were stolen from said King. There is a word for the fashion of the knee walls but I need more coffee to recall it. Sometimes words just escape my alledged mind. These boards face the room all around and at the top is a c hair rail molding. from the moldings up there is lath and that is covered with horse hair plaster where it existst still today. Of course a lot of that has been replaced with common sheet rock.
OH gosh, I should have known LOL...Maryland. I see $50 seedlings (the Wye oak...a famous tree..but still!), and the program for $25 off the price of a tree. Sigh. I'm still continuing to plant native trees, shrubs etc on my property nevertheless.
I did pass a sign for the farm bureau's tree sale today... Maybe I'll stop by tomorrow and see if the prices there are any better. Thanks for the tip SCgranny. Trees rock.
OH gosh, I should have known LOL...Maryland. I see $50 seedlings (the Wye oak...a famous tree..but still!), and the program for $25 off the price of a tree. Sigh. I'm still continuing to plant native trees, shrubs etc on my property nevertheless.
I did pass a sign for the farm bureau's tree sale today... Maybe I'll stop by tomorrow and see if the prices there are any better. Thanks for the tip SCgranny. Trees rock.
Holy cow - do they come with a reeul gennywine 14 millymeeter gold-plated $50 coin proof?
Good luck, kinkytoes! Maybe you need to ask in a verrry rural county.
SCGranny, your trees might be silver maples. They were very common when I lived in central Nebraska. My Dad had silver maples in western Iowa. We tapped them and made maple surup. Of course sugar maples are much better, but these worked!!!
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(the Wye oak...a famous tree..but still!), and the program for $25 off the price of a tree. Sigh. I'm still continuing to plant native trees, shrubs etc on my property nevertheless. 
