Thanks for the reponse. I asked a local nursery guy that seemed informed and he said that all his blueberries do it and that it seems like some form of sun protection that goes away as they mature. This confirms ericwi's post. After some observation this seems to be the case. There is quite a biut more new growth on the plant and it seems fine, there haven't been any flowers on this plant yet . . I hope it blooms at least a little this year. Again, thanks! FYI - I planted another variety a couple weeks ago that already had berries (unripe) and it already has new flowers). Yippeee . . . I planted a blackberry as well and it already has fruit and plenty of flowers now as well. Just waiting for them to ripen. I never knew these kinds of plants could survive or thrive in the middle of Los Angeles. Happy growing . . .

Amaranth, aka red-root, pigweed. Amaranthus retroflexus FataMorgana

Here is a follow-up development: While I suspected the tree suffered from chlorosis from the alkaline heavy clay, I bought a can of iron-chelate and experimented it on one of the branches. I dissolve a few grams of iron-chelate powder into about 2L of water. Then I dipped all leaves in the "experiment branch" in this diluted iron-chelate solution. I then dumped the iron solution right onto the root ball. After 3 days of the treatment, I noticed that the dipped leaves appeared much greener than the rest of the tree, which hasn't improved (or got worse). So I still suspect cholorsis in play with the red maple tree. I am going to dip more leaves to see if there is any good improvement. By the way - against all wise advises we still decided to replant the tree in order to: (1) Raise the tree bed to improve drainage (2) Cut the circling roots (3) Most importantly, remove the sod that I, due to lack of experience, burried at the bottom of the planting hole. At the time of exvacation, the root ball was swimming in a large pit due to poor drainage (not visible from the surface). The smell was awful (guess this is what CSI calls "decomp"). We removed all of the decomp mud, washed the tree's roots, and cut off the roots that have been affected by the rot. We also cut off the encircling roots. We then widened the planting hole from 2.5' to 3.5', filled it with fresh black earth & clay (30-70 mix). We elevated the root ball to be about ~6" above the ground surface. We compacted the mound to make sure there wasn't large air pockets. Then we covered it with ~4" of red cedar mulch, leaving about 6" of space around the trunk. It looks like a large red donut circling the tree. Hopefully the tree will recover from the surgery.

Midsummer problems are because the soil is overheating. I understand you've planted a shrub to help prevent this but it would be in your best interest to mulch the clematis quite heavily with 3 to 4 inches of mulch. And continue to water & often, during these heat spells. Dax