Dogwood (Cornus florida) provides the most reliable and enduring fall color on our Dallas lot. Can remain a very small understory tree in heavy shade or larger with more sun. Another bonus is the spring bracts on mature trees. Is native in much of MS.

This post was edited by bostedo on Sat, Nov 29, 14 at 13:55

if the trees are in color right now ... down your way ...

get to an arboretum ... and take a nice fall walk ... and take pix of the trees you like ... and the tag ...

if lacking tags.. take a pic of the whole... and then the leaves with a scale ... even just your hand... and perhaps the trunk ..

if not here.. try the name that plant forum ...

it would so much easier... to ID things you LIKE ..... rather than write a thesis on the colorful trees of MS ...

also.. contact your COUNTY extension office... they might have brochures or some such.. and you could get a list.. and we could opine on such ...

good luck

ken

Thanks to you both for your suggestions! There isn't an arboretum close by where I live, but the closest one did have a website loaded with useful information.

Crape Myrtles and Japanese Maples are two suggestions.

Smooth sumac, black gum, sweet gum, sourwood,and red maples are southeastern natives and easy to grow.

I know they're not trees, but there are some blueberries with really nice color, and blueberries are outstanding as far as holding their color for a really long time. 'Bonita' is my favorite for color here in NC.

Some Asian persimmons (D. kaki) can have spectacular red color, too, and the later maturing persimmons can have large bright orange fruit that will hold into the new year that's even more spectacular than the striking fall foliage (e.g. 'Tecumseh'.)

With red maples I will point out you need to select the sedling in fall to see if it has good color or buy a specific cultivar. Their color is variable.

Bradfords sure are terrible. Good job reading first.

Your native bald cypress and its cousin dawn redwood both have good fall color and grow fast. Limb up the dawn redwood for a more formal appearance. I would love to have two planted to compare.

Serviceberry is a smaller tree/bush depending on which one you pick. It flowers, has berries and most turn a good fall color. None seem to hold long in my yard on my tree cultivar whichever it is lol but I do like it.

Is your yard pretty normal or is it down right wet? How much room do you have?

The Bradford or other ornamental pears are frowned upon because they usually split their trunks or limbs as soon as they get limbs big enough (and therefore the wood is heavy enough to split) and there are other trees that if you give enough time to grow will reward you with better form and stronger limbs in the same amount of time as the Bradford pears. I think that you need to step outside of the normal boring nursery fare. There are many trees for zone 8. I don't know how much room you have though. I will say that if you have a lot of room the Southern Live oak tree, is ideal for your area as a lawn shade tree. However if you have a small yard and want several full sun plants in your landscape, you have many plants to choose from, but, my suggestions are not going to be of much help.

Thanks for much for all the suggestions everyone! As far as the size of my yard goes, it's somewhat small, but not tiny. I have enough room to have a few large trees.

Or, you could select smaller shrubs that provide winter color, such as camellias that bloom, and Nandina 'FirePower' which turns a bright red ALL WINTER, or add some hollies providing bright red berries along with lustrous evergreen foliage.

In zone 8, you have a lot of evergreen broad-leafs that will grow well.