Our 25 year old sugar maple tree is loaded with seeds this year and I was wondering if they will sprout and make sugar maple trees? We don't remember it having seeds before. The seeds are double and only one side has a seed in it, the other half being empty. I will probably try to grow some of them, but would like to have some information about them. Our other maple trees are sprouting in the flower beds all the time. Thanks in advance for any information.

Maple seeds (called "samaras") are best harvested when the papery wing part of the seed turns brown, but the thick fleshy part of the seed is still slightly green and not dried out. They need to be stratified, which means they must endure a period of cold. What I do is harvest the seed, break the pair of seeds in two, and then plant them in a shallow 4" garden pot - cheap plastic will do. Do not plant them deeply. You may want to cover the pot with some wire screening to keep out the squrrels and chipnumks if you have a problem with those in your area. Plant as many pots as you want and then find an area for them to spend the winter. They need to be exposed to the cold and rain. In the spring you should have new maple seedlings come up. If you don't see seedlings, don't give up. Sometimes it takes 2 years for them to sprout. Then just transplant the baby trees to whatever part of your garden you wish. Easy! P.S. They can grow for a whole year in that 4" pot if necessary.

It's hard for me to tell from that distance. Can you take a closer photo of the leaf shape? You may be able to ID it yourself by googling images of "Norway maple vs. Sugar maple" or similar. http://oregonstate.edu/dept/ldplants/images/acpl-sa2.jpg http://homepage2.nifty.com/chigyoraku/worldleaf1.jpeg

Well, actually they just came from an apple we got at Walmart. We are aware that the the quality of the fruit is unknown when grown from a random seed but it's still a fun experiment.