I personally don't care for a hedge line of the same tree, but one of my gardening books suggests digging a trench and spacing the trees in it that way. I guess it helps the form stay narrower and straighter. Planting the same tree over and over again, touching the next ones is almost asking for a disease to come in and wipe them out. What I like is a staggering of a variety of bushes and trees. There are many flowering and fruiting bushes that quickly get 10 feet tall and feed the birds. Besides those, there are many different and interesting evergreen trees to choose from if you are looking for a beautiful, soft distraction more than a wall. If you want a wall, why not put up pretty privacy fence and then plant whatever you like in front of it? Variety just what appeals to me.

oakleafs grow at a decent clip, but i don't know how much the clay might slow them down. i planted mine in clay and it has tripled in size over about 5-7 yrs. was about 2' when i planted it- is about 6' all around now. i don't know what size the pot was, but it very well could have been 3 gallon. i haven't babied it at all- if you watered & or fertilized, the growth might be faster. nice flowers that persist. and remember, oafleafs are deciduous, so your screen will be bare come winter. i have a weeping yaupon in pretty heavy shade, and it's done well. i didn't plant it there, and in fact didn't know what it was for a long time. i think it must have been planted 20 yrs ago. there's a second one that's very stunted beside it. it's nice and dense and is about 10' tall. doesn't bloom or set as many berries in the sahde, but the form is still nice. althea(rose of sharon) can do ok in light shade and has the advantage of fast growth and nice blooms in a range of colors half the summer. disadvantage- it sets seeds. if you mulched well it might not be a problem. it's also deciduous. if you find someone who has them, they'd be happy to share, probably. i know i will if you want some. we had one that was about 15-20' in the backyard before fran came through. the remaining ones are about 12'. you might consider planting 2 or 3 types of plants in your space, just to vary it a bit, and so that if any one thing doesn't do well, the others can carry its weight. it tends to look a lot more natural, too. you can have your cake & eat it too if you have some evergreen & some deciduous back there. i would think for most things planting now would be just fine. good luck! tammy

Catalina Cherry grows wild around here, and most of them are in shade and do pretty well. The growth is more open in shade than in sun. Carefully headed back, they make a nice screen. Also look at Rhamnus californica, a lovely shrub. Toyon, Scrub oaks and Manzanitas also come to mind. Many of the CA native shrubs are found in the shade of native oaks, so they adapt. When they are small, young plants, most do better with some shade. Here is a link that might be useful: coffeeberry

Mia, I think overwintering cannas in pots in central OK is iffy. Your success would vary from year to year depending on how cold it gets. Last winter they likely would have survived in pots, but the year before they would have frozen. The general rule-of-thumb with any container plants is that they are considered to be growing one zone colder since they are above ground and subjected to outdoor air temperatures without the insulation of the ground all around them. So, if you are in zone 7a in OKC, your cannas in containers would be overwintering outdoors in conditions the equivalent of zone 6a. I also think whether they survive in a container is dependent on how the weather cools down. A long, slow gradual cool-down before freezing temperatures arrived would be better for them than going from warm weather to shockingly cold weather in a matter of a few days. With a long, slow cool-down the plants acclimate better to increasingly colder conditions over a prolonged period of time and seem to handle it better than going from hot to cold pretty suddenly. Dawn