Okay, time for something different... maybe.

{{gwi:966667}}

This is my yard as seen from space... with a little embellishment. The image looks like it was taken two years ago in the winter. I decided to use this to fully illustrate my issue. The top three green circles are where I used to have my pygmy date palms planted... before I knew what I was doing. As you can see, this would have put them deep in shade come winter and on the north side of the house. So to help prevent them from being frozen during the winter, I moved them to the new location on the southwest side of the house. They will still get a little of the western winds, but they will be able to warm up during the day and what you can't see is that there is a nice stand of Live Oaks to the west that will help to buffer the wind a little. The shed just above them has also been moved more to the west, so it will help to keep them from getting nailed by winds directly out of the north... but that's not my issue.

My issue is now I have three bare spots on the north side of my house and I'm not sure what I want to plant there. I purchased a nice Firebush at the Wings and Wildflowers festival, but I really don't want to plant that on the north side since it could possibly die to the ground with that wind exposure and shade. Whatever I plant in the left-side spot can not be water aggressive as the dark blue line is where the septic line runs. That spot is also centered on my kitchen window. The center spot is centered on my dining room window and the right-side is centered on my son's bedroom window. The light blue line is the water main and there's probably 15-20 ft from it to the right-side spot, so I probably shouldn't have anything that will seek that pipe out either. Ultimately, I would like to keep the plants native so that there will be minimal upkeep once they get established, but non-invasives will work too. And while the north side is deep shade in winter, during the summer this area gets baked all day long. So the plant(s) need to be able to tolerate that much sun. I am pretty open to all sizes of plants, so trees are an option. I almost picked up a Walter's Whorled Vibernum today to put in the center location, but I didn't know at the time how well it would handle the location. I would like something fairly showy to be in the center spot, since it will be viewed by the family during meals.

Anyways... I'm just hoping some of you can throw out some options for me to pick through. Oh... and azaleas and dogwoods are out due to allergies.

Thank you for your time!