Need some help from an arborist

[Lee Schierer]

I have two red maple trees in my front yard planted about 35 feet apart.
The bark on this tree looks pretty normal.
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The bark on this second tree has large bark scales curling up from the trunk.
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Is this normal for a maple tree, if not is there anything that I should do to cure whatever is wrong with the tree?

[Mel Fulks]

Looks to me like both are too far in the ground. You should be able to see a flare all the way around, that area is like
a tree thermostat . I would remove some dirt.

[Jim Becker]

To my eyes, they are different species...

[Adam Herman]

im with jim, maybe a silver and a norway? have to see the leaves.

[Mel Fulks]

Look different , but that is possible even if the seeds came from same tree. That's why nursurys graft .

[Dennis Peacock]

Can you post close pics of the leaves?

[Andrew Seemann]

Any chance the second one is a silver maple? That is similar to what the bark looks like on mine. I can't quite see if the leaves are different on the two trees.

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[Lee Schierer]

Can you post close pics of the leaves?

Here is a photo of the leaves. The one on the left is from the shaggy bark tree, the one on the right is from the smoother bark tree.
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Apparently they are different trees. I never actually put the leaves side by side before this.

[Tony Zona]

Isn’t anybody going to ask what that can is hanging in that second tree? It looks like a muffler.

I’m no help on the tree species. I have one with bark like that, but its a hickory and quite big.

[Adam Herman]

Isn’t anybody going to ask what that can is hanging in that second tree? It looks like a muffler.

I’m no help on the tree species. I have one with bark like that, but its a hickory and quite big.

the bird house? seems perfectly normal to hang from a tree if one is a bird house.

[Lee Schierer]

Isn’t anybody going to ask what that can is hanging in that second tree? It looks like a muffler.

It is a bird house made from 4 inch pvc drain pipe. Wrens and Chickadees use them. I have several hanging from trees around the property. If you look closely at the first photo there is a white bird house hanging from a branch in the upper right corner of that tree as well.

[Andrew Seemann]

I'm guessing the leaf on the left is a Red maple, and the one on the right is a Sugar maple.

[Tom Bender]

Neither is Sugar, Silver, Japanese, Striped, Norway or Sycamore Maple. There are many more that I'm not familiar with. The shaggy bark tree is probably an exotic in your area.

[Lee Schierer]

The smoother bark tree is definitely Red Maple.
My Red Maple Leaf ------- Exemplar Red Maple Leaf
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Here is the other leaf from my yard....Different exemplar of red maple
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It appears that both could be Red Maples, but the difference in bark is strange.

[Jim Becker]

There are so many variants of Maple (and other species) that sometimes it can make one's head spin! They tend to get grouped together sometimes from a practical perspective with some entities that sell trees, too.

[Steve Demuth]

Both trees and both leaves look consistent with Red Maple (Acer rubrrum) to me. You'll know in the Spring or fall, 'cause A rubrum is the only North American maple that I'm aware of that has scarlet red flowers, and the leaves are brick red in the fall. Generally, the leaf stems are also reddish, which isn't apparent in the first of your pictures, but I don't think that's definitive. Your leaves also show some of the characteristic chlorosis that A rubrum gets when grown on a too alkaline soil.

There are five maples indigenous to your area. They are not striped maple, and if they were silver maple, you'd know by the coloring of the back side of the leaves. They don't look like sugar maple, so that leaves black and red maple. Looks like two red maples to me, but as I say, the fall color will be definitive.

[Steve Demuth]

There are so many variants of Maple (and other species) that sometimes it can make one's head spin! They tend to get grouped together sometimes from a practical perspective with some entities that sell trees, too.

Maples are a little complicated, but there aren't that many species East of the Rockies, and they are not rampant hybridizers compared to, say "white" oaks. Much of the the diversity in maples is because of cultivars planted in urban and suburban areas which were selected for specific characteristics.

But the "white" oaks in the woods - could be anything. They cross every which way.

[Tom Bender]

Steve
That coarse bark is really unusual. Seems like it must be a different variety, certainly not something I have seen in New England.

[Lee Schierer]

Steve
That coarse bark is really unusual. Seems like it must be a different variety, certainly not something I have seen in New England.

I went back out yesterday and looked at additional leaves. Both trees have identical leaves. I can find examples of the rounded bottom leaf and the pointed lobe leaf on each tree. The only difference seems to be that one has shaggy bark. Even though they are only 30 feet apart, the shaggy bark one is in a slightly wetter area of the yard. Both seem healthy. BOth bud out at the same time and their leaves turn the same red color and drop at the same time in the fall.

[Andrew Seemann]

Maples around here will get that shaggy bark sometimes as they get older and larger. Silvers more so than Sugars, but they both will do it. Reds are less common here so I don't have a lot of experience with them, but I would guess they would do it as well.

[Mel Fulks]

I posted too deep in ground is bad. Well, Ive got a serviceberry tree with all yellow leaves in a "wild" area.
It should have berries, but does not. Checked it today and saw soil had washed down covering most of the flare.
I opperated. it's going to do just fine.