Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Acer negundo
Common name
Box-elder maple, Box elder, Ash-leaved maple
Family
Sapindaceae
Where found
Forest, woodland, disturbed areas, and along streams. ACT and in and around Sydney. Occasionally elsewhere.
Notes
Introduced deciduous tree, often multi-stemmed, to 20 m tall. Can form dense thickets that exclude most other species. Bark smooth, becoming rough and fissured or flaky with age. Young stems hairless, often somewhat glaucous. Leaves opposite each other, 15-38 cm long, compound, with 3-9 leaflets each 3-15 cm long, 20-80 mm wide, entirely green, or green and white-variegated, with scattered short hairs on the lower surface, margins irregulary toothed to shallowly lobed. Male and female flowers usually on different plants. Flowers green, yellowish green, or pinkish to purplish, with 0 petals, and 5 sepals about 1 mm long, in clusters 2–15 cm long that hang down. Flowers appearing with the leaves. Flowers Spring. 'Seeds' initially green, turning yellowish and then pale brown as they mature, 30-40 mm long, with 1 wing, in pairs.
Family was Aceraceae.
Pest plant ACT.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Acer~negundo (accessed 2 January, 2021)
This identification key and fact sheets are available as a free mobile application:
