This is Acer platanoides or a hybrid, not Acer cappadocicum! That has smooth green shoots (until at least 3 years old), and smaller flowers which open later in the spring after the leaves have finished expanding.
AH! the bark is very similar to acer cappadocicum ligth purple and white striped,now i have platanoides and the bark is grey and orange striped!
Shoots of Acer platanoides (top & bottom), and Acer cappadocicum (middle two). Note the shoot colour!
Michael, it is reportedly a selection of subsp. lobelii, AKA Acer lobelii, does that make more sense?
Nope; Acer lobelii has very distinct glaucous wax coating on the young shoots, which Alex's specimen doesn't have.
Hmmm....might be better to file this under Acer × De Oirsprong or some such, with a link from here for people who see it listed under this name. Any suggestions? Here are some pictures from Esveld website, seems to be a Dutch introduction; probably only available from Esveld at this time.
True; given the strong yellow in both Alex's plant and the one pictured at Esveld I would assume they are the same plant, but it is by no means proven. Alex, please post some more pictures if you can. Anyone else growing this care to comment?
I'm not growing De Oirsprong but I am growing Aureum as well as the species. As I understand it De Oirsprong is an upright form of Aureum. I think there is a fair amount of morphological variation, for example my Aureum, which is a medium-sized tree, has twigs no where as green as in Michael's picture. Rather they are red veering to yellow or completely yellow at this time of year. (My tree has swollen buds but hasn't leafed out yet.) A species cappidocicum that is regrowing understock from a failed ssp sinicum graft, growing very enthusiastically as one might expect, has very red shoots. This doesn't explain the brown, but when I look carefully at Alex's picture I see short nodal growth, a greenish yellow, on the spur under the leaf to the left. Not sure but it looks to me as though this is limited growth from last year, and the main branchlet is actually from 2 years ago. So perhaps the new growth is just very small -- as we all see from unestablished trees from time to time -- and is actually greenish yellow. Time will tell. (The bark here really doesn't resemble cappadocicum a great deal, but it's awfully hard to tell from this one picture). With all due respect Michael, I think the time of flowering is easily explained by climate and cultural differences. It's certainly not beyond Esveld to ship the wrong tree, it has happened more than once to me. But this really does look like Aureum leaves, in as far as one can tell in this still folded state, so I don't really question it this time. -E
first thank you for your interest!i'm not expert of taxonomy and key ID.this observation are for me very important :) another pics the bark grey is of platanoides,the flower with purple leaves are of platanoides Crimson King ,i posted this for one comparison ,because like emery suggest the italian climate change the form of flowers
