I am not sure about your climate extremes, but you have experts in your backyard. Call Chicago Botanical Garden and ask for their Senior Horticulturist. First decide whether you want a light background to frame a dark leaved maple, or provide a contrasting background to compliment a green maple. The disect maples are hard to resist! Buy an inexpensive reed or bamboo shade to experiment with your background. Please post your results!

Check out Mountain maples at:

http://www.mountainmaples.com

Find the "tree finder" link and play with the drop downs.

Personally I like "TAMUKEYAMA" when I gotta worry about too much sun and I want a dark divided leaf shape. I had one in Redding, CA. for years and it got into the 120s quite frequently. Never burnt.

Michael

Michael, impressive variety. What are your humidity extremes during this high temp?

Don;

Not in Redding anymore..... Not very humid in the North Valley. Not like your neck of the woods. A favorite saying about the weather was "it's 120 degrees but it a dry heat...." I could care less, it was hot!!!!

Here is a link to a website that recommends Japanese Maples for hot areas in California. Not sure about high humidity. This list worked for me but your results may vary........

http://www.lakesnursery.com/page19.html

Michael

Thanks, Michael