Sam, I hope you find some of it useful :) I find the directed breeding of Japanese maples to be an intiguing subject and one that I have not seen adequately covered in books or even discussed online that much. It would be interesting if those growers and breeders who know much more on the subject than I do would be willing to discuss it.
Great stuff about the insects. Maybe i could use the net to cover the canopy and yet not have the next reach down to the ground. That way the insects could get inside but i am keeping out any unwanted pollen floating around in the air. Pollen season is terrible around here. I cant wait to hear what my uncle has to say as well. His thing is esoteric plants and flowers, but I am sure he knows plenty about this topic.
It's an old article, but you'll find a method for controlled pollination of maples on the second page, under methods: http://germanjournalofforestresearc.../archiv/silvaegenetica/16_1967/16-5-6-165.pdf
Hi, hoping to revive this thread once more to pick the brains of you japanese maple geeks! I live on Vancouver Island - west coast of Canada - and bought a large property with quite a few JM cultivars. There is a lovely 8' tall vase-shaped tree with highly dissected leaves, a larger round 12' tall tree with light green dissected leaves, a tiny 3' tall dwarf with dissected red leaves, a weeping/sprawling one with green dissected leaves. And a Crimson King in the front yard. I have stumbled into the same rabbit hole as you others and have been rescuing and tending the seedlings which mostly appear under the first tree I described. Most of them appear similar to the "mother" tree, but last year I saved two that have shown themselves to have the more "canadian flag" shape of leaf - not dissected. My biggest question is, could they have cross-pollinated with the crimson king, which at 40' or so would make for a very different tree.
No, Norway maples and Japanese maples do not cross pollinate, from what I understand. The are in different Families.
