I would be VERY leery of using black bamboo - I think you'll want to check out the thread below discussing this. More proof that depending upon what salespeople tell you is just not the most reliable information, unfortunately. It seems to me that the biggest lack of privacy is at the corner, where the side yard widens into your backyard. I assume you use your side yard like most people do - it's a passageway, not a destination? That looks like a gate at the end of your photo. In that case, access and not interfering with the house drainage are the really critical aspects of landscaping the side. What if you created an angled bed that contained a couple of strategically placed small trees? The bed can segue into a long narrow bed against the fence (warning: you'll need something to form a soil barrier to prevent the fenceboards from rotting) for some nice colorful plantings to break up the "march of wooden fenceboards" look (I have the same problem, as you can see from our photos). Here's what I mean about the angled planting bed. Place the trees correctly, and they should interrupt the neighbor's sightlines and give both of you some visual privacy without seeming rude. For the side yard, yours seems a bit narrower than mine, so imagine just the concrete path and the planting area on the right, which is only 12" total - you should be able to make yours about 18". We started off with this: And ended up with this 3 yrs later: Our zone 9 is very different than other regions so I won't suggest plants outside of cannas. I've had excellent luck using shrubs trained as standards, though - they're faster growing than trees, and often provide beautiful flowers as well. Here is a link that might be useful: Black Bamboo: clumping or running?

Sorry; I was wrong about thinking that the Corintian Rose and Mauve cultivars as being new developments. Did some checking and now realize that a few years after more nurseries began offering the Ornamental trees, I must have seen a photo of the Corintian Rose which appeared to bloom more red colored. But the latest photos I have seen of the Corintian Rose seem to reveal that tree's blooms being more true to what reported descriptions of it have been turning up. Dr. Dennis Werner had successfully developed these Corinthian peach cultivars, and reports of them started showing up in web perspectives back over the winter of 1998-99. Those perspectives projected that nurseries would be making these trees available by the winter of 1999-2000. I have not seen the standard nurseries in my area offering these trees, but after I inquired about them to my favorite nursery on the northwest edge of town. They fairly easily found some being offered to the wholesale markets from a local regional grower. My extra research about the development of the different cultivars has reminded me of what I had obviously forgotten when I posted what I replied above. The truth is that Back in the winter of 1998-99; the cultivars which had already been developed were Corinthian, White, Corinthian Pink, Corintihian Rose, and Corinthian Mauve. With the Rose and the Mauve cultivars just now showing up more often on various web sites, must mean that now those cultivars are catching the eye of people more than the White and Pink cultvars are right now. One thing I do know is that the photos on the web of these trees do not capture the dynamic beauty that one is surprised to see in any of these trees that are thriving out in their planting beds. Must be something about the camera shots being so far away that the size and shapes of the flowers appear more non-descript in the photo's and also the amazing way that the sun make the colors of those flowers to appear so stunning must be an aspect that the camera's missed capturing in those photos of these trees that I have been more recently seeing on the Web. I know that the Pink cultivar blooms certainly are such, simply because a friend of mine planted four of these trees along the narrow strip along her front driveway and that boarders her neighbor's yard. The first Spring that her trees burst out in bloom, her husband who never seems to say much about the items at her house that we have planted, well even he, was taken aback at the sight of how stunning those blooms were. At first sight he rushed to get his camera and quicky attached that photo to an email and sent it to me to let me know how amazed he was at first sight of those tree tree's bloom. That was 3 years ago, and the only other item he has reacted the same about was after he first saw blooms, on the hardy, Blue Satin Hibiscus that I had trained up in a tree form and helped my friend plant at her house. Those clear blue...

I would agree that Treeguy has good suggestions. I also, despite the fact that you like and HAVE the Lacebark Elm, would agree with him on not planting it. If it isn't already invasive in your area, maybe you shouldn't give it a chance to become so. If you REALLY like it, you can keep it in the pot, like a large bonsai, and pick off all the seeds. However, since you will continue to need to drive through the area to get to the back, I would try for a tree that can be limbed up to allow you to drive under it, rather than plant a tree whose branches will be in the way. Not that there may not be a couple of years, while whatever tree is in its youth, when branches will be in the way, but a permanent "in the way" is NOT a good idea. I would go with the Tupelo from the list, or try for a Tulip Tree (maybe too tall?) - both of them will grow tall enough to look good after limbing up. The Redbud and the Dogwood will stay too small for driving under, especially with a pick-up truck, IMO, and the SBM will also not lend itself to driving by or under. I think you need a tree that will grow to 25-40', fairly quickly, and maybe more. Just plan for the eventual width as well. If you aren't needing to drive to the back frequently, then maybe another of the larger trees might do - most of the maples' roots tend to be surface, but oaks' are usually deeper, as are (to my knowledge) a thornless honeylocust, or a catalpa - although there you would possibly have to put up with the caterpillars. A single-trunk birch is another thought, although the roots might be a problem. Ironwwood, Katsura or Linden are also thoughts. A good mulch layer - no more than 4" - and possibly laying down sheets of plywood or OSB to spread the truck weight out might help also with soil compaction over the roots. And if it is only once or twice a year, then I wouldn't worry too much abut it.

Jane, yours is a wild cherry, Prunus serotina, not buckthorn. It doesn't have the prominent leaf veins on the leaf underside that buckthorn has, and the edges of the leaf are finely toothed unlike buckthorn's smooth leaf edge. The cherries have their own stem with nothing but cherries on them rather than the buckthorn's many small stems for berries off of the main woody stem/branches. If you open one up you will recognize small cherry pits, and there is a bitter cherry taste if you are brave (I think buckthorn has 2 or 3 seeds.) One of the keys is the small lines in the bark (technically lenticels) on the cherries, where the lenticels on the buckthorn are dots. The other key factor for me is when you scratch cherry twig bark it smells like almonds, while the buckthorn has its own distinctive odor that isn't easily described, but definitely isn't almond. My memory is also that the buckthorn fruits have a clear yellowish flesh under the dark skin, while cherry fruits have the dark stain in the flesh in the same way commercial cherries do. Prunus serotina is native, and while it can be messy (the fruit stains as you would expect cherry to do) and it does seed around some, it doesn't IME outcompete and choke out other plants as buckthorn can do. Here is a link that might be useful: Prunus serotina, wild black cherry