The other two pictures show the view from the other side, it is easy to pick out the branching structure backlit by the sun and you can see how close together they are planted. The first photograph shows them looking northwards from the nearby path, (ignore the tree trunk to the left of the picture).
![japanese maple japanese maple](https://www.thetutuguru.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Empeor-One-Maple-768x914.jpg)
They were literally only a couple of metres away from each other and the surrounding area had many larger trees making the whole area very crowded and it was difficult to get a good photograph of them. palmatum, listed in the database as 17m, 18m and 18m. I found another group of trees labelled as Acer palmatum ssp. Here are photo's of the remaining tree from the group (13.0477): Also, they would have been overcrowded so it is perhaps no surprise they needed thinning. One of the cut-off branches had fruiting bodies of some kind of bracket fungi suggesting a possible reason why they were cut down. Checking the ground it was clear that a stump or stumps had recently been ground out also.
![japanese maple japanese maple](https://live.staticflickr.com/6239/6355157231_a793348d1a_o.jpg)
I widened and widened my search area to no avail, and eventually returning to the area immediately around the 16m tree I noticed that on the ground there were several logs, and sections of trunk, from Acer palmatum, some still with dried up leaves attatched. I found the 16m tree very easily and identified it from the tag number, but the other two were nowhere to be found. Unfortunately the one listed in the database as 19m tall is no more! It was part of a group of palmatums close together listed at 19m, 18m and 16m.
![japanese maple japanese maple](https://nickmchardy.com/images/garden/japanese-maple.jpg)
I checked out some of the taller palmatums at Westonbirt Arboretum the other day, many of which were planted in the 1800's.