Thanks for the suggestions! blakrab: Diciduous is ok. I'm surrounded by evergreens, so it's nice to have some diversity. not sure if we have any other open space to plant more though (property is overrun by coast live oak which sprout like weeds here. Every year I pull out about 20-30 saplings, and seems like I'm making no dent in the growth density here... every few years I have to have one cut down since they start crowding eachother too much). I'll take a close look at the Texas persimmon. Is that anything like the persimmons you find sold in stores? (orange fruit)? There are few of those in the area. if so, may be there'll be enough in the area without having to plant another in our lot... hoobv: it's a pretty densely vegetated hillside property, so fire is always a concern. But never really thought bout tree-fire exposure (we're usually more concerned with shrub/grass fire). I said 15ft, but just looked at the survey map, and it seems like it's actually more like 25 ft from the house. making a terrace is an interesting idea. the tree can be taller, as long as it's the type that is conducive to shaping/height reduction management. but taller tree usually means faster growth (may be) and hard to manage? and thank you for the tree selection guide. I'll ahve to take a look at that. An arborist who just came by recommended chinese pistachio. He said around here, it doesn't get much bigger than about 25ft or so, and has great fall foliage, drought tolerant.. doesnt require too much water in the summer so won't hurt the juniper either (I called it juniper, but arborist said cypress, so... hmm). The tree sounded good until I found out that it has a potential of growing to 60ft.. i'll have to do more research on that tree.

Fuzzy, it may be time for you to do a "desired lifestyle & available time to enjoy it" check. You built a GH for pleasure. Please don't tell us it was to feed your family, because the simple truth is that building and operating a small home GH is far more expensive than simply buying fresh veggies and if you are into all natural, there are plenty of shops around these days to accomodate you. In fact, you could shop exclusively at Whole Foods and still not spend what it costs to build and operate a small home GH. Ergo: you built it to ENJOY it and unless you are independently wealthy, the TIME available to you to ENJOY it is when you are NOT working to earn the $ it will cost to operate it. So don't get so wrapped up in gadgets that you end up spending as much if not more TIME messing with the mechanicals than you do puttering with plants. Perhaps it's my age, but the older one gets, the more one appreciates TIME- The Great Thief.

daylily, no offense at all :-)) I completely understand where you are coming from and only wanted to point out that this is indeed a pretty common occurrence!! However, one of the major responsibilities of a skilled landscape designer is to guide their clients/homeowners towards good design choices. That is, after all, one of the primary reasons they have contracted with a designer in the first place! And one of those "proper" choices is to ensure that the garden is not overplanted from the beginning. IMO, designers that do overplant (or overdesign) - even at the client's wishes - are doing their clients a major disservice both in terms of economics and overall plant health. And appearance!! This is not always an easy concept to communicate, however. Most homeowners get any garden design exposure they have from TV landscaping shows and we all know how condensed and far from true life these really are. They are done entirely for show, not for practicality, so an overplanted landscape is pretty much par for the course. It has to look perfect, not spotty, for the reveal at the end of the show!! I sometimes wonder what these "perfectly filled-in" landscapes look like a year or two down the road........not very good, I bet. I just did a consult yesterday afternoon that mirrored this exact situation. The clients inherited a grossly overgrown garden when they moved in and have spent considerable time and effort in clearing out the excess. Now they want to replant and wanted my help in plant choices and placement. The wife totally got the need for restraint and allowing things to fill in over time. The husband however wanted to cram it full of plants right now - no bare soil showing - and it took both of us some doing to convince him otherwise!!

Hi Elmer I read through your comments strongly supporting NG over HP option due to its cost advantage. Do you know a 10 KW solar system can be installed in CA today for $15000 after tax incentive , which will generate approx. 15000 KwH of electricity per year ? I am exactly doing this for my 1995 built 3375 sq ft home in bay area as this appears to be the cheapest route to bring down my energy cost as compared to other options like improve insulation, change windows or upgrade 1995 installed 80% efficient NG furnace etc. Till my NG furnace is alive and kicking, I plan to use it minimally in the morning to take the chill out of the home and rely on supplemental electrical heating ( resistive ) to keep the house warm . Resistive heating is inefficient, but ok as stop gap option particularly if my electricity is coming from solar. When it's time to bid farewell to these antique NG fired machines, I plan to take HP route for my home heating and air conditioning. Even without any of these actions and just install of solar, my current electricity only bill will be reduced from $2800 / year ( 10000 KwH ) to zero. That will pay for solar install cost in just 5 years. Add to it cost saving from an electric car ( which I don't have at this time ), payback is even shorter. My yearly NG heating consumption is 700-750 therms. The baseline consumption of 20 therms / month or 250 therms / year will always remain due to NG cooking appliance and NG water heater. But the rest 500 therms / year NG consumption can be eliminated when I replace central ducted existing NG Furnace / AC system with ducted heat pump (no splits). There will be more upfront cost to install heat pump as compared to NG furnace / AC option , but I am hoping this differential to be in the range of $2-3K , particularly if I go with heat pump option like MrCool Universal ( will work well in temperate Bay Area weather ) instead of fancy Fujitsu or Mitsubishi heat pumps. And saving of $1000 from eliminating consumption of 500 therms / year should help offset this cost sooner rather than later. Due to these considerations, I decided to go for 10KW Solar System that gives me enough capacity of solar generated electricity to meet these loads. Time to give a fresh look to all ( almost ) electric home with recent price reduction ( actually since June, 2020 ) in solar install cost.