Hi Wendy, Pretty yard--may I suggest three golden cypress to be planted near your Japanese maple. They will give you great contrast. If they get enough sun they will turn a beautiful golden green. If less sun they are still quite a pretty green colour. In my front garden (which is about three-quarters of the length of my home) I have a very large weeping Japanese Maple in the centre of my garden. On the right I have a very large weeping Norway Pine for height. For medium height I have a Corkscrew Hazel and a Sandcherry. For the lowest height I have three Golden Cypress. At the back of this garden, to conceal the foundation, I have a hedge (which I keep trimmed to the height of the foundation) of Japanese Boxwood which stays green all year. Interspersed among the above I have two Hostas and right now lots of Daffodils. In the summer I will plant some annuals for colour. In the fall you can always "hide" pots of mums. Hope this gives you some ideas. CR

After this HOT summer I am TOTALLY rethinking my post ... and it may be even be the correct cultivar that is green in TX even in May since it is HOT down and I now think most red JM's will NOT keep their color in the summer in hot climates...VIRTUALLY none of mine did this summer...except for a few that were in alot of shade but not total shade...This went for both dissectum and broad leaf varieties.Some varieties like the tamukyama and bloodgood and kasagayama, Emporer1 and my beautiful Beni Otaki said to hold their red color well throughout the summer were TOTALLY green by mid july... in fact the ONLY full sun cultivars that stayed red in full sun were my Shojo Nomura and my fire glow ( which had some rather severe leaf scalding)...and many are just now turning their fall red. If this happens in central Il.( hundreds of miles NORTH) during a hot summer I don't see HOW you can ever gurantee any JM to be reliably red throughout the summer in GA or TX even in partial shade...I'm sure there are exceptions and humidity and soil type plays a part but if I were "in the landscaping biz" I surely wouldn't want to guarentee it...unless you like constantly replacing cultivars. There is also the FACT everyone has their own idea of red and to some a "redish" summer color would be fine to others they would pitch a fit!!! I think you CAN reliably guarentee certain JM cultivars to be RED either dark or bright, in spring and fall and maybe early summer depending on where you live ...but NOT all summer in southern climates or during unusually hot summers even in northern climates. David

I had this happen and I left both the main trunk and the suckers alone. Over time it became apparent that nothing was going to happen with the main trunk. Fortunately, the suckers got taller and wider and now the resulting tree is even nicer than the previous one. I guess it all depends on if you are willing to live with the variety you get with the rootstock, or if you MUST have the grafted stock to please yourself. Mine happened to be very similar so it didn't matter.

I see that censorship is alive and well on the Gardenweb. I've seen a lot of Japanese maples in my life and I've seen many with multiple branches low on the trunk but never one that has several trunks coming out of the ground like in the photos that Dave posted. It truly does look like a shrub. That look is not my cup of tea for a Japanese maple. If I want something that looks like a lilic then I'll go buy the lilac. IMHO, the Burgandy Lace was not pruned properly when it was younger although that it strictly from a viewpoint of aesthetics and not structural abnormalities. Looking at it's branching structure, I don't see any branches that resemble the acute angle on the maple in this thread. I still maintain that the latter needs a pruning job to correct for a structural defect. A tree that gets this large is going to act like a sail. Consequently, the wind is going to get leverage on any tall trunks that branch low on the tree. I am not saying that a Japanese maple needs to be pruned to look like an oak tree or any other really large tree. What I am saying is that sound pruning practices are applicable for any plants above a certain size. It is irresponsible and amateurish to suggest otherwise. It is also hypocritical to suggest this for some trees but not others not to mention confusing for anyone new to the Gardenweb. I must respond to one of the deleted posts. Basically, it was stated that this tree will not recover and fill out from pruning off the second leader. K4 hit the nail on the head in his response which was that the tree will throw out a lot of new growth next year after this leader is pruned off. This new growth will provide plenty of opportunity to shape the tree into a far better look than it has now. Without question, the tree will quickly fill out and I question the practical experience of anyone who states otherwise.