You did discover the problem. Many reports have been posted on this web site, which list that a tree often times will survive if planted too deeply, but even though it survives, its growth and development will be stunted. It is good to know that the rootflair is not circling and in good form. When you raise the tree, use a heavy tonged short handled garden fork and pack lots of soil beneath the rootball. Try to do this from one or two sides only, so you will not have to raise the root ball completely out of the soil. Your tree should end up being high enough that the soil level covering the rootball is just under the spot on the trunk where the topmost root of the rootfare is growing out of that trunk. Then once the base soil is compacted enough not to settle more and over time not to let the tree sink too low again; simply dig away enough soil from one side of the root ball so you can use a sharp knife to cut about and inch deep from the top of the rootball to the bottom. After doing that, fill the dirt back in on that side of the rootball. Repeat the digging, cutting, and filling back in process for three more times, until you end up having made 4 cuts evenly space all around the rootball. Finally, pound three 6 feet tall "T" stakes evenly space around the tree's trunk and about 10 to 12 inches away from the trunk. Secure the tree to the stakes with non bark-damaging ties, but keep the ties slack enough for the tree to still be able to sway some during prevailing winds and wind gusts. Check and adjust these ties every month, or before if it can be clearly seen that the tree needs to be adjusted to prevent too much trunk lean and/or too much sway that could make the new roots growing out from the root ball become broken out of the new soil. This breakage might occur from too much root stress if the entire length of the trunk is allowed to trunk whips back and forth with the wind. Be patient with your tree, because many reports describe sugar maples trees as being slow to establish. You will know your tree finally is well established once you begin to see it growing at least a foot each year. If you have continued to adjust the ties by tightening or loosening the slack as the tree indicates is needed; by that time when the tree shows it is well adjusted, then the tree should be able to handle the the removal of ties. After you end up doing that watch the tree, and if it does well then you can also remove the stakes. If not, you will need to retie the tree, but maybe by that time only two or one of the stakes will need to be secured to the tree with ties. If that happens then each month try to increase the slack in the ties a little more each time, until you notice the tree probably no longer needs to be staked.

I have done a lot of warning about dangerous trees. I have found that individual property owners usually take action. The tree department in D.C. never heeded any of my warnings. One tree I warned them about was a really large sugar maple growing in the Georgetown section. It had some ugly fungal fruiting bodies coming out of the base. Within a year or two it crashed down. I did not see the immediate result. I don't think any of the buildings were damaged, but I bet a lot of cars parked on the street were destroyed. Do what you can to alert the proper authorities, and maybe the homeowners on the street. You may save a life and/or some valuable property. --Spruce

Although Sugar maples are native in TN, if you bought a generic, non named tree, you have no way of knowing if its seed came from TN, or somewhere like Ohio or Vermonet....seed provenance matters. It might do better over time simply by having a more extensive root system, but in your zone you are better off with either verifiable TN seed source, or a named variety like Legacy or the Caddo types that tolerate hot summers better.

For the best Northwest display of brilliant orange among the large-growing species, there is no rival to the eastern American sugar maple (Acer saccharum). Seattle's dry summers and sterile gravelly soils are perfect for stressing this species, thereby, as it were, inflaming its passion and causing it to blush sooner and redder. Seattle's largest sugar maple, 90 feet tall and 72 feet wide, is a street-tree on Capitol Hill, on 17th Avenue East, just south of East Roy Street Here is a link that might be useful: Rising Maples