Acer sutchuenense Franchet

The rarest member of Section Trifoliata, both in cultivation and in the wild, Acer sutchuenense is one of the most recent maples to arrive in western collections. Seed of the species was sent by NACPEC collaborator Kang Wang to the Arnold Arboretum, Massachusetts, and Longwood Gardens, Pennsylvania in December 2023 (T. Aiello, pers. comm. 2023), gathered from Shunshuiping, Zushan County, Hubei Province (Arnold Arboretum 2026). Plants arising are clearly yet to become established in collections, but the introduction has been met with much excitement among the maple fraternity.

It is somewhat surprising that, given the species comes from an area much visited by collectors, it has not found its way into gardens earlier, though its rarity and the notorious difficulty in propagating members of its section have doubtless had a bearing on this. Material was collected from the Shennongjia region on the 1980 SABE expedition (SABE 222), and germinated at the US National Arboretum (Nicholson 1997), though seemingly no plants were successfully raised. In 2006, Peter Wharton and Koen Camelbeke observed the species in the Dafengding region of southern Sichuan, growing at around 2175 m asl (Wharton 2006). Wharton described first seeing a coppiced stump, as well as plants to 20 m tall, growing in an area rich with maples, with Cercidiphyllum japonicum and Davidia involucrata among other woody associates (Wharton 2006). The species was thought to have been introduced by Ernest Wilson and was listed by Veitch (1906), though this material turned out to belong to A. henryi (van Gelderen, de Jong & Oterdoom 1994).

The hardiness ratings given here are suggested based on its similar geographic origins to the related Acer griseum.