I just purchased a 'Winter Flame' from Greer gardens and it arrived yesterday (5/20). It took about 3 weeks to receive it 'cause they are so busy this time of year. It appears to be quite healthy. Shipping was $15 since it was air shipped. My only concern is that the package was quite warm and the plant was warm due to the heat. I'm hoping it didn't affect it.

Just to complicate things further, you can add 'Beni Kawa' to that mix :-) With the exception of Fjellheim, all the others are equally scaled down versions of Sango Kaku, only getting to about 10'. Fjellheim will stay smaller, closer to your desired size. All produce bright, almost grass green foliage, have a similar leaf shape and fall color and vivid winter bark color. My personal choice is to limit any pruning for size whenever possible, just to eliminate the possibility of disturbing the natural form of the tree. That would direct my choice to Fjellheim, all things being equal :-)

We planted a Winter Flame Japanese maple in Fall 2009, and it's doing very well in our yard near Green Lake. Here's a photo of it right after we planted it. It's in a protected patio area that's about 20' wide between our house and our neighbors', so it only gets morning sun for 6-8 hours then it's in the shade the rest of the day. It was about 3.5' tall when we planted it in fairly rich soil with lots of organic matter and worms. Even though last summer was relatively cool, we had to water it every few days, or its leaves started to wilt. it's now about 4-4.5' tall, and the new growth this summer is about 6-9" long. During summer it has small healthy green leaves with yellowish-red new growth, so it looks like every other green Japanese maple. BUT In winter it's BEAUTIFUL! Most of its trunk and stems get bright red, both old and new wood, unlike the 'Sango kaku' on which only the newer wood is red and the older wood stays greyish-brown. Our Winter Flame had several black stems tips the first spring after we planted it, which may have been Pseudomonas syringae. Now I don't prune it and our other Japanese maple until after they start leafing out, and there were much fewer black stem tips this spring. It's definitely slow growing, but otherwise, it's a great little tree.

It depends on a few factors - how damp the soil was before the plants went into dormancy, if there's a mulch or snow cover, if you're getting any snow melt. Around here, its high desert, very low humidity, rarely any snow cover, but most stuff is mulched. I soak things pretty well in October and thats usually enough. However if its a dry winter, with little snow, come March and April and the wind starts to blow, it can dry things out to the point that perennials start to die. The gardeners joke around here is to use a moisture meter, the kind with the long spike. If the soil is so dry that the spike bends when you try and poke it in, you need to water. :-)