Japanese Maple Producing Leaves of Different Color

Q: A local nursery trimmed up our Japanese maple. Any idea why it would look like this? What can I do, its an expensive tree. The top is the original color.

A: This is a grafted Japanese maple. Somehow the rootstock has been allowed to grow and compete with the desired part of the tree.

All you need to do is trace the limbs with the light red leaves back to their source and cut them out.

Once these limbs are gone, the main tree may look a little unbalanced but it will gradually grow to look better as the years go on.