big leaf maple

there are maple trees all around us here in northwest washington state, among the firs and alders and whatnot. marveling at the huge leaves we see, we remembered that we had not seen such large leaves before. robin's east coast childhood provided a memory of maples with much smaller leaves. my own childhood in mid-coastal california didn't seem to have any maples, probably due to my unconsciousness. imagine our surprise, he said, using a cliche, to find out that big leaf maples, Acer macrophyllum, grow only on the west coast of north america from british columbia down to southern california; maybe a bit in idaho. even more surprising, to us anyway, is that sap from big leaf maples contains about the same concentration of sugar as does the sap from sugar maples, Acer saccharum. the taste may be different. read a bit more about big leaf maples here.

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picture porteait of the artist as a young tree. that's a mighty big leaf.