I received the proposal for the work. To some extent the plants selected and the numbers of each is based upon plants of sufficient size which are available now. So I would like to stick with these choices for the moment. My question is which to plant where. The area has several sections that I list the proposed plants for. Left Side - This is the long 4 1/2 ft fence on the left side of the property. This is the shortest fence. Ideally I want there, the plants that are tallest, fastest growing and that are "wide" making it hard for dogs to jump across them. I have no clue of the proposed plants meet this goal best of those available (again assume that I only have available the 192 plants that I list). Back - This is the 5' fence along the back. About 5' behind it is another 4 1/2' fence. Right Side - This is the 6' fence on the right side of the property. About 5' behind it is a somewhat broken down wire fence, sagging in places, 3 to 4' high. Because this side will have the 6' fence it can have the smallest plants. Right Side from House - This is a cross fence on the Right Side going from the garage to the 6 ft fence. This would have the plants planted facing into the back yard (where dogs would be) Left Side from House- Back - This is a cross fence on the Right Side going from the house to the 4 1/2 ft fence - This would have the plants planted facing into the back yard (where dogs would be) Left Side from House- Front - This is another cross fence on the Right Side going from the house to the 4 1/2 ft fence - This would have the plants planted facing into the front yard. Therefore the choices here are more aesthetic since the dogs would not be in the front yard. On the below list some spellings may be wrong. I have an emailed sketch and it hard to read a couple of things. Left Eleagnus 9 10 gal Pineapple Guava 7 15 gal Viburnum 7 7 gal Wax Myrtle 6 15 gal Back Bottlebrush 9 7 gal Wax Myrtle 2 15 gal Viburnum 5 7 gal Wax Myrtle 4 15 gal Ligustrum 8 10 gal Pineapple Guava 5 15 gal Ligustrum 13 10 gal Right Bottlebrush 8 7 gal Wax Myrtle 5 15 gal Pineapple Guava 7 15 gal Wax Myrtle 5 15 gal Eleagnus 16 10 gal Right side of house Variegated Pittosporum 10 7 gal Left Side of House - Back Wax Myrtle 11 15 gal Variegated Pittosporum 5 7 gal Left Side of House - Front Lopopetallum 10 5 gal Giant Lipiope 12 1 Gal Foxtail Fern 9 3 gal Indian Hawthorn 10 3 gal Agapanthus 6 1 gal Crape Myrtle 3 15 gal

Hi Pinar, I'm also in northern California just north of Santa Rosa. In my previous home, we had a Podocarpus between us and the neighbor and it only gave so-so privacy. We then planted a red oak that was fast growing and had very large leaves, but the squirrels wouldn't stop girdling it and we had to remove the top 30 feet that had died. I'm now in another house in the same town, and have a privacy problem with a two story addition going up next door, so I'm planting two Chinese lace bark elms. We researched for four months looking for the ideal tree, and found and there's no tree that will check all the boxes, but the Chinese lace bark elms came the closest; the only negative for us was the maximum size which can reach 50 feet tall. It's fast growing, tolerates short periods of boggy soil, is drought resistant once established, isn't picky about your type of soil and has few pest issues. I see that you're looking for an evergreen and the Chinese lace bark elm may or may not lose its leaves depending on your climate. There's one in my town that must be 60+ years old and in January it still has most of its leaves. Several of these trees were planted in the Kaiser parking lot in Santa Rosa a few years ago and they quickly grew to provide shade with dense growth of narrow leaves that flutter in the breeze. They're beautiful.

sng: I like the way you research. Do a copy and paste for -- Callistemon phoeniceus -- and you will find considerable info on the web via Google. I have a feeling you've misspelled it somehow. It's a shrub to about ten to fifteen feet, easily trained into a "standard" or multi-trunked "tree". "Escallonia x exoniensis ÂBalfouriÂ, E. laevis, E. rubra ESCALLONIA We excluded Escallonia for making the following assumptions:" Your assumptions are inaccurate. The common Escallonias are almost always trimmed into tight hedgelike masses; hence making it hard to see the potential as a small tree. Along the coast, especially, the listed ones (not so common) make great multi-trunk small trees. -Melaleuca armillaris BRACELET MYRTLE -Melaleuca ericifolia HEATH MELALEUCA "I have probably seen these plants somewhere but do not remember if they are dense enough for our purpose. I will try finding them in our neighborhood and do more research." Although these species have fine-textured foliage, they do grow into densely-foliaged small trees. I'm attaching a photo of one (they look alike). -Metrosideros collinus ÂSpringfire NEW ZEALAND CHRISTMAS TREE "I always liked this tree but never knew the name. The street I take every day to work is dressed with this tree on both sides and they are quite tall, probably 20-30 feet (may be M. excelsus?)." The "trees" you see are M. excelsus and they get bigger than 30 feet. M. collinus is smaller. And conseuqently slower growing. -Pittosporum crassifolium KARO "I see this planted practically everywhere I go. (Maybe because I live near ocean and work near SF bay?) SF Botanical Garden uses it to screen chain link fences and it does the job so well. I really love the slivery blue green foliage of this plant that goes beautifully with the deep maroon color of its flower. Urban Forest Ecosystems Institute marked all PittosporumÂs health hazard as allergy, except for P. tenuifolium that was marked as unknown. I had no way of telling likelihood of causing allergy but did not want to take any risk so dropped all Pittosporum from my list except for P. tenuifolium. But now I have a further reference on this so I will definitely reconsider P. crassifolium. Thank you again." There are over 160 species of Pittosporum. I doubt that all of them are allergenic. The two most common ones (P. undulatum and P. tobira) are highly fragrant and, because of that, highly allergenic to many people. P. crassifolium is not significantly fragrant (as with P. ten.). Joe Here is a link that might be useful: Melaleuca ericifolia

I ruled out bottlebrush after seeing they are in the top 5 for allergies - I have some pollen allergies so I don't think I should plant something potentially allergenic to me! Then I suddenly remembered - Manzanita! How could I have forgotten these? They come in shrub or tree types, have interesting branches, evergreen leaves, low water and are fairly fast growing. Today I bought 2 different upright-tending types and planted them. However they are only tiny right now, the little 2' ones were $8 and the next size up was a $100 huge pot, not even sure I could dig the hole for one that big anyway. So it may be a while before they are appreciably taller than the perennials there. One is "Austin Griffin" manzanita, matures at 8-10' and has an upright habit, and the one I planted on the end corner where it has the most space is Dr. Hurd which should reach 10' and have a more branching canopy. And I got a lovely Camellia for the back patio, it's a Camellia sasanqua 'Kanjiro' about 3' tall and the tag listed it as part shade or full sun. I hope it will like the back patio area because it will get full sun for 1-3 hours in the AM depending on the time of year, and shade after 1pm even in summer. The nursery told me the red and pink varieties are more sun tolerant than the white, I originally wanted the Yuletide camellia but the tag on it said filtered sun, so I wasn't sure if it would like full sun for part of the day... so I bought the Kanjiro instead. Here it is... after it blooms this winter I plan to remove some of the lower branches to encourage it to grow more upright.