We recently purchased a beautiful japanese maple for our backyard. We have a newdog, and I want to make sure that the flowers, seeds and fruit produced by the tree are not toxic to animals.
Products made from other maples are consumed by humans, maple honey and maple syrup for instance. If the dog is apt to attack plants I'd be more concerned about the dog being toxic to the maple. You may have to separate the tree from the dog with secure fencing anyway.
yes i agree with Ron maples aren't toxic ;oleander ,taxus bacata,are more toxic,for man and animals,(taxus bacata not for bird that eat the berry!!!)
Not always predictable; Red Maple is toxic to horses in a unique one-to-one instance (other animals not affected by Red Maples; other maples not toxic to horses). But I'd agree with Ron, any damage is more likely to be the other way.
Michael, do you know what the equine pathology is called? Interested in researching it a bit, thanks. Otherwise, dogs are definitely toxic to maples, but mostly only little ones. -E
Sorry, don't know, but if you put [ "red maple" horse ] into google, you'll get lots of hits, including several refs from veterinary journals. It is something in the fallen autumn leaves that poisons them (they can eat the foliage in summer safely). No known cure, apparently.
Thanks, I've done so. If I find an interesting synthesis I'll post it. The condition seems to be called hemolytic anemia. -E
You are right about the Red Maple being very toxic and can kill a horse. I just found this out recently and that is what has prompted my question, and caused some concern about our 9 month old puppy. We have 2 very large crimson kings and the pup bit and carried around the leaves in his mouth when he got the opportunity last spring and summer. These are not toxic to him. Apparently they are of a different family of the maple than the red maple. I put in a good sized Japanese Maple last summer. I am now wondering if they are related to the Red Maple and toxic to animals as well. ~Patty
No, Norway (Acer platanoides) and Japanese maples (A. palmatum) are from different parts of the genus than red maple (A. rubrum). Red maple can be confused with red-leaved cultivars of Norway and Japanese maples in discussion, when these latter are referred to as red maples (instead of red-leaved maples). As said above the toxicity to horses seems to be peculiar to red maple. Silver maple is a close relation and crosses with red maple yet I don't remember seeing anything about silver maple being a threat to horses. Also do not recall how crossing the two may affect the toxicity issue, hybrids are often sold as pure red maples by mistake. If there happens to be a tendency for the silver maple parentage to diminish the toxicity (like if it were a recessive characteristic) then ironically mis-placement of hybrids in catalogs as pure red maples might occasionally result in them being passed over unnecessarily as poisonous, instead of making them appear more desirable.
I have many Japanese maples, including in containers, and also 3 dogs. One would regularly eat plants, and once she did chomp down on a spring maple with no ill affects to her. She had a particular penchant for coleus, which always made her throw up, and the herb garden, but mostly she ignored the maples. I always worried about the neighbor's black cherry, which are evidently fairly toxic, but we never had a problem there, either.
I definitely agree that dogs may be very toxic to Acer palmatums. My two Welsh Springers love to chew the tender shoots and have to under surveillance when in the garden and are never left alone there. Gomero
