Extra Long growth on some Maple branches

[hrhofmann]

I have a mature maple tree in my back yard. Last week one of the upper tru nks split and came down. It was on a very rainy day and the tree had recen tly leafed out. The tree appears to be very healthy with new growth on all branches. The split occurred on one of the main trunks about 20 feet abov e ground.

As I was looking closely at the tree to see if there were any obvious poten tial future failures, I noticed that at the end of one of the branches off of the main trunk, several new growths/shoots were more than two feet long. All over the rest of the tree the new growths were about 4-6 inches long. There no long growths anywhere else that I could see.

Anyone here have any ideas what causes this, and do the fast growths lead t o future weaknesses in those branches? Any suggested web sites for further reading?

[Muggles]

Do you have any photos?

[Meanie]

Perhaps it came from the side of the family which was well endowed.

Is the sun mostly on the side where the branches are longer?

[Moe DeLoughan]

Plants, including trees, don't have a circulatory system. In other words, the roots in one area feed the branches that are connected to those particular roots, and only those branches. Sounds simply as if that section of the tree was getting more sunlight, water, or food and was thus more advanced than the rest of the tree.

[hrhofmann]

I have 5 photos at the photobucket address:

The fast growth is a noticeably lighter shade of green than the slower-grow ing growth. It is closest to the camera in 4 of the photos. The one photo, against the sky, shows a couple of the longest growths, more than 24 inche s long while all the regular-looking new growth is 6 inches or so and defin itely a darker shade of green.