Oh Kath, it sounds like you've already planted those alberta spruces. I think this is a mistake. Your front entry is so pretty...really a focal point of the house, with the stone, the columns, the beautiful color of the door, and the side windows. Why, in the world, would you want to be put clumpy, bumpy, lumpy, dime-a-dozen dwarf alberta spruces there? Dig them out and put them somewhere else where they are not "specimens"...include them in a planting with more elegant beautiful things and they actually can be an asset. DON'T obscure the best feature of your home. Remember, you are dressing your home like you dress yourself. Show off your best feature. Think of it this way: say you have a beautiful, graceful neck and collar bone. Show them off with a lovely, fine, delicate necklace of diamonds...don't cover them up with a clunky, boring, bought-at-Walmart acrylic scarf. I know that the thought of digging up plants and moving them is a pain, but it will be worth it. (By the way, I'm the plant-moving queen. My neighbors joke that I don't look at home without out a spade in my hand. I'm ruthless that way. And, believe it or not, I've never had a plant die because I dug it up and moved it.) You could dress up your front entry with a large (and I mean good-sized)pot of beautiful annuals. Or you could go the trellis and roses route on the side to the left, with a shrub rose off the bump out to the right of the door. A small bed of well-chosen perennials with some height is also a good idea. Sorry for complicating the picture. Patty

JB, 3 or 4 feet high will not afford much privacy unless you are hunched over right next to the shrub line picking weeds or picking up a ball. An expectation for privacy in your front yard seems to be a tall order to fill. Your current plant layout doesn't provide screening views from the side views. The rule of thumb for privacy is a six-ft high fence or planting, but having that in your front yard would seem to be anti-social. Privacy outside is somewhat hard to do in the suburbs with neighbors so close together and two-story houses. When I go outside I don't expect privacy, and I don't do anything outside I would be embarrassed to be seen doing. Okay I sing to my girls, but that's only embarrassing if you were to hear me! I find total privacy (meaning no views to the outside of my yard) to be unsettling, because I like to look out of my yard to see what's happening. A screen of fence or plants with select breaks allows for viewing the outside world from inside the confines of the yard, but any passerby would have to be more deliberate in intruding to view into your yard. I would think, if you are using the front for playing then, what you really need is more security. A fence or planting to keep kiddos, toys, and bikes from leaving the yard. What I have noticed in my neighborhood is that if cars can see my kids in the front, then they tend to slow down and drive more carefully.

Although I'd never plant one in Tucson, a cottonwood might work for you. However it will need a LOTS of water for maximum growth. Ours went from a volunteer seedling to a 15 footer two summers later, with only lawn watering (this was in Illinois.) It didn't seem to pose any problems other than the fact it was too close to the house, which is why my Dad ultimately removed it :(

Thanks everyone. Okay, the pictures showing the house are what is there, except for the roses (Red Blaze & pink and white Fairy roses) on the fence (not shown), with tall Bridleswreath spirea bushes and a Forsythia with old-fashioned Day lilies. It is so dry along there. This year I added a small white Rose of Sharon. The other FLOWER pics on the entry page are just plants I have that I was considering using to add some color to the front yard in Summer and then in Fall. I would like to plant roses on either side of the front steps to grow up the pillars to mingle with that dark green ivy, but worry about the thorns. There is a huge buttery-yellow flowering Lady Banks Rose on the south side (right side of the porch). I would love to add roses out front...shrub roses which are hardier and bloom from Spring thru' Fall. I am going to remove the purple garden phlox on the left (north) side of the porch. It got crowded out by the Nandinas and has become scraggly looking the last few years. Time for a change. I would like to add a Winterberry shrub out there somewhere, and some pillar-type evergreens, and three Colorado Blue Spruces...maybe some meadow flowers around the spruces and some big rocks. I can get big rocks anytime if I catch the county road grader guy when he goes by. He will push them to my driveway. I just have to get someone to help me move them into the front yard. Whatever goes out there has to be tough, I can tell you that. Cameron, There are many types of prairies. The type most people thik of when they hear the word "prairie" is like the one you see on the old TV series, "Little House on the Prairie". That is the Shortgrass Prairie, which is in the American Savannah. This area where I live in Central Oklahoma is where the Tall Grass Prairie changes to Hardwood Timberland. This Eco-Region is called, "Cross-Timbers and Southern Tallgrass Prairie" The Native trees are: Black Willow (aka Creek Willow or Pond Willow) Blackjack Oak Post Oak Chinquepin Oak Red Oak White Oak Shumard Oak Boxwood Elm Slippery Elm Bur Oak (introduced) Hackberry Cottonwood (I also have 2 large Aspens) Oklahoma Red Cedar (State Tree) Oklahoma Redbud Texas Redbud Texas Buckeye Wild plum Chickasaw Sand Plum (a shrub-like tree) Mulberry (introduced) Catalpa (introduced) Mulberry (introduced) Paper Mulberry (invasive tree introduced from China) Persimmon Osage Orange Possum Haw Fringe Tree Sweet Gum China Berry (introduced) Texas Ash Black Walnut - all I can think of off hand. Winged Elm (introduced) Black Haw Black Hawthorn Elderberry (a shrub that can get as tall as a small tree) Red Osier Dogwood Carolina Buckthorn Prairie Grasses: Big Blue stem Little Blue stem Inland Sea Oats Switch grass Indian Grass (State Grass) June Grass Love Grass (introduced) Muhly Grass Buffalo Grass Frost Grass Eastern Gramma Grass Side Oats Gramma Blue Gramma Woodward Sand Blue Stem Prairie Sand Reed Canadian Rye Panic Grass (introduced) Tall Fescue (introduced) Blue-eyed Grass Foxtail Barley (There are others, but I cannot recall them now) Prairie Flowers: Purple Poppy (aka: Wine Cups)- love these! Snow-on-the-Mountain Orange Butterfly weed Silver-leaf Nightshade (blue flowering) Clasping-leave Coneflower (yellow w/brown cone - waxy leaves) Purple Coneflower Pale Coneflower (Echinacea pallida) Narrowleaf Coneflower Gray Coneflower Purple Prairie Clover Prairie Dogbane - waxy leaves and purple stems Stenosiphon (tall growing w/small fuzzy white cone flowers) Wax Goldenweed Compass Plant (sunflower-like flowers w/ fern-like leaves) Ashy Sunflower (very stiff ashy looking leaves) Wild Quinine (purplish stems w/ tiny white flowers Joe Pye Weed Iron Weed (purple flowers) Yellow Iron weed Tall Boneset (tiny white flowers) Daisy Fleabane - tiny white daisies Carolina Larkspur (tiny plants) Lanced-Leaf Coreopsis (aka Tickseed) - golden yellow Plains Coreopsis - golden yellow w/reddish brown centers Rocky Mountain Bee Balm Spiderwort Lemon Mint (Horse Mint) - purple flowers Wild Four O'Clocks Blue False Indigo (blue flowers) Wild Indigo (cream flowers) Mist Flower - minute purple flowers looks like purple mist Yellow Gaillardia Yarrow (white to pale lilac) Maximillion Sunflower Pink Primrose Arrow-leaf Violet Passion flower (flowering vine) Yellow Primrose Gayfeather (purple Liatris) Dotted Gayfeather (Liatris) Rough Blazing Star (purple Liatris) - aka: Snake root Yellow Coneflower aka: Camphor weed Blue Speedwell Bitterweed Flannel leaf Mullein (grow your own toilet paper!) Mexican Hats Prairie Rose Gentian Indian Blanketflower (State Wildflower) Red Honeysuckle Yellow Japanese Honeysuckle (introduced) Blue Mealy Sage Blue Sage Cardinal Flower (Red Sage) Golden Rod (short variety) Golden Rod (tall and stoleniferous) Obedient plant Black-eyed Susans Brown-eyed Susans Scarlet Indian Paintbrush Prickly Poppy (Cowboy Fried Egg Flower) Wild rose (white rosettes - very fragrant) Prairie rose - tiny leafed, low-growing 8" plants False Garlic Nodding Onions White Prairie Aster Purple Rose Verbena Slim Prairie Aster - blue-violet flowers Heath Aster Wild Violet (has triangular shaped leaves) Leavenworth Eryngo (thistle-like deep purple flowers) Bull Thistle Globe Thistle (introduced - I think) Blue Indigo Ox-eyed Daisy (one of my favorites) Buffalo Burr (such a mean ting!) Partridge Pea (yellow pea-like flowers) Catclaw - Sensitive Brier (fuzzy pink flowers like a Mimosa) Shepherd's Purse Purselane Gerardia - low growing w/pink buttercup-like flowers Sow Thistle - similar to a dandelion Musk Thistle Spider Milkweed (cool looking green flowers) Illinois Rattlebox plant Poppy Mallow (light pink) Yellow and pink Wood Sorrel Prairie Ragwort These wildflowers WERE all growing up in my meadow until the new land owner next door sprayed with Herbicide to kill off "weeds" and native prairie grasses. The wind blew some of that over into my side and then the rains carried the herbicide down the hillside thru' my property. Bye-bye wildflowers. Some how the grasses survived, except for the Love grass which was growing next to the fenceline. (grrrrr) So I am now reseeding the meadow. Except for the large native trees and one very old and very large Lilac bush, I planted all the trees, bushes, plants, groundcovers, and flowers in the one-acre yard around the house. The other acre is the meadow up on the ridge. There are two natural wooded areas that border the meadow. A small one on the west side (downhill) and a big one further up the hill on the south site.