and perhaps that is why she should ask in the conifer forum .. since the resident tree nut .. admits he is no conifer expert .. lol in conifers.. size ESTIMATES are generally at 10 years ... and if you divide any given number by 10.. you get a general annual growth rate .... and yes.. it usually has a range.. how it all works in your zone.. in your garden.. is left to fate.. and getting fully established ... carp.. now she doenst need to go over there.. lol .. screening really has nothing to do with spacing.. or annual growth rate.. its a function of how fast you want the screen ... do you want to wait 5 years for them to screen??? ... its all about instant gratification ... vs natural form ... ken

dibbit, i'm glad you looked up about the mayapples! here i was, thinking i'd ingested something horribly toxic as a kid. (sort of like the folks who grew up eating fiddle heads, only to discover in the past few yrs one of the main types is pretty carcinogenic). we never ate many of them- they are pretty sour, like sourweed/grass (oxalis), so i never discovered the laxative part. lol. but they are good. wouldn't be surprised if the foliage is poisonous, though. they have pretty white flowers in april, too. and yes, they do go dormant pretty quickly. mine are usually gone by june. rather than rounding them up, if you really don't want to live with them, please consider looking up ncnps. someone will be happy to come and get them. i think they look like fairy parasols. i still think the 'grass' is river cane or switch cane. it needs really ideal conditions to get big, and i often see it growing at only a couple feet high. it gets taller in the woods near creeks than in the sun or an open area. they are in the grass family, which is why it may appear as grass. if the stems are woody, though, i'd lay money it's one of the arundinarias. japanese stilt grass isn't up yet, and it doesn't get woody stems anyhow. if you mowed it off repeatedly, eventually the roots would starve and stop trying to grow the canes. probably take quite a while, though- boos are pernicious.

Thanks for the replies and suggestions. I will have to look into the Wilt-Pruf for the Mountain Laurels as well as my other broadleaf evergreen shrubs. Wirosarian, that makes total sense. I did have my soil tested and it was on the alkaline side. To help with my acidic loving plants I periodically throw in freshly used coffee grounds around those plants, working the grounds into the soil, to give them a little boost. My Rhodo's and my Mountain Laurels seem to be loving this treatment - well, except for one Mountain Laurel which doesn't look like it is going to make it regardless. I guess only time will tell. Hopefully next spring I will only have the one Mountain Laurel to replace rather than replacing all 3 with a different shrub all together.

Houzzers on this thread have great ideas for landscape, but gardengal48 is right... you might find Houzzer's in your area that chime in more better equipped to help on the gardening forum. I'm in zone 6. I actually designed my whole yard and it (to me and people out on walks stop to say how much they love it now) is very nice after tearing out what was done by previous people. Yet, that may be a good option to best help you from costly mistakes.