I grow most of my shrubs in more or less that format. They may not all perform in your area but they are leatherleaf viburnum (V. rhytidophyllum), Hydrangea aspera, Philadelphus, elderberry (Sambucus nigra 'Guincho Purple'), Disanthus cercidiphyllum, and one that naturally grows in this shape, Leycesteria formosana. And, for that matter, some of my rhododendrons. The primary criterion for success with this form, it seems to me, is that the shrub has to not sprout too aggressively from the base once it has relatively mature stems. This rules out grafted shrubs, or at least, it does if you don't always want to be pruning suckers from the base. In fact my contorted filbert (Corylus avellana 'Harry Lauder's Walking Stick') would also qualify, and Hamamelis cultivars such as 'Diane' could do so, but there are always suckers. And even on others, you have to ruthlessly remove new growth from the base unless you want one to grow into a replacement stem - and I do prune out old stems from time to time. I also failed to achieve this form with Vitex, because mine sprouted aggressively and very laterally from the base - but that could have been because we cut it back severely at one point. I'm just working on converting it to a single stem tree form. The Vitex's history actually brings me to another criterion for success, which is that the reason we cut it back hard was that we were moving it AWAY from the house wall where it WOULD NOT grow upright - it leaned so far out that the adjacent patio became useless. It, and all my deciduous shrubs, now are planted away from structures and fences so that they get light from all sides, and they grow nice and straight )although if shaded by each other or other trees they also grow their bulk toward the sun). Next to a structure or wall, any deciduous shrub will lean away. If the garage is fairly low and the plant can get light once it grows above it, you can train it upright until it gets there. If the garage is taller and you can determinedly tie to the garage even as the plant grows to its full height, then of course you can grow whatever you want there - just don't expect it to happen naturally. I finally had to ask on another forum why conifers don't seem to have this problem... turns out conifers will grow upright even next to walls because they grow against gravity rather than toward light. Deciduous shrubs, on the other hand, grow toward light. Geotropic vs. phototropic, I think it was. Broadleaf evergreen shrubs, like rhodos and the Viburnum, seem to have some mix of the two properties, but don't quote me on that. I base this on noting how they grow in one-sided light conditions. Karin L PS another good candidate might be Hibiscus syriacus.

To me, the bigger question is why is this black walnut seedling the only one? Since you have a tree that produces nuts, I would expect you to be so tired of digging up all the black walnut starts..and for most of the year, since here I notice the new ones spring and summer, but eventually by fall I find the sneaky ones that hid from me earlier in the season. My 'across the street and down one house garden' had one of the largest BW trees around until recently ( many of us are sad it ended up having to go ). Such a beautiful tree. But the darn nuts the squirrels forgot still are a neighborhood pest. This is the third or fourth year post-BW tree and while I'm getting fewer than before, there are still enough I do an eye-roll and a sigh as I go for the spade. Regular weeding tools don't go deep enough, you have to get all the way down to where the nut was planted. If you have whacked at any of these seedlings repeatedly with just a sturdy weeder, the problem only becomes a much bigger project getting rid of monster,, twisted, deep root. The ninebark is a beautiful plant, one you paid good money for and have invested time and effort towards. BW seedlings are a dime a dozen and grow FAST! Personally I would look around a bit more and find a different seedling. If that fails, and you are the tidiest gardener ever, after you come over and help me try to keep up with the garden ;) , you can plant some nuts this fall, then pick the one that is truly outstanding in the group to save for your future tree. Seems like that tree would be the winner in many ways and you can say I started this as a nut ! Be sure to take a picture of the nut for the baby book. Just think how the size of the new BW tree will be in family photos over the years. :) This post was edited by plaidbird on Tue, Jun 25, 13 at 2:49

Not quite, it is a step-by-step search. I started out with http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/4279855/buying-ugly-ducklings?n=33 until it turned out that the beautiful tree of pic #1 is a Cornus controversa which is not hardy in my area. So, I was looking for airy trees that are hardy in my area with the subsequent thread http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/4286285/small-airy-tree-for-backyard-birdwatching?n=5 In that thread, I started out with photos of the Cornus alternifolia and the Crataegus submollis to illustrate what I am after until 2 folks pointed at the Amelanchier (great thanks!) I discovered very soon in my readings that the Amelanchier nomenclature is a mess, it is like using the word 'red' for the color 'blue' or sometimes 'yellow'. So, in this thread I am focussing on the Amelanchier. I am not an inexperienced pruner, BTW. I have 5 conifers in my front yard, 2 of them are topiaries, 1 of them is heavily pruned and 1 of them is lightly pruned. I also managed to kill 2 conifers that way. So I do know first hand that you can't just prune in ways that (individual) trees don't want to be pruned even if you follow all the rules. Maybe you simply don't know what is possible to achieve with pruning and what is not? I want to avoid killing or disfiguring an expensive Amelanchier caliper tree. Perhaps I need to plant 2 or 3 Amelanchier caliper trees side-by-side to achieve the effect in the pic in conjunction with minimal sideways pruning. That would indeed be very expensive though, ouch.

Ontario_Canada5a_USDA4b Thank you for the 'Sargent Tina' idea. It 's lovely, but old garden roses and a lilac already reserved these sunny spots for themselves :-) The hydrangea forum is an excellent source. NHBabs and other folks there gave me excellent advice for the situation I thought was impossible to solve. I am very happy with 'Annabelle' they suggested and she has flowered wonderfully.