Really nice space. Liking the water feature. The landscaping company has an incentive to sell you as many plants as it can.

Rather than crowd your small space, consider just outlining the planting area (perhaps leaving an opening for walking into it) with the one plant you know you like and want, at least to begin with, and then adding small white gravel around your water feature and between it and that one row of plants.

You could then add a few pots colorful pots with a few of the suggested plants to set atop the gravel and see how well they do in your yard to let you get to know the plants before deciding which and how many of each you want.

As you buy the plants for your pots, make sure you get the names of each plant written down and do some research. If one of the plants will spread and has the potential to crowd out other plants you like, you might not want to choose that one.

If one plant draws more hummingbirds and butterflies than others, that may well be the one to pick.

After you get to know the plants you can begin to dig out the white gravel and add them to your planting area.

Thank You! The local nursery was very helpful but I just want to check out other options.
Great idea with having plants in pots first!
here is another closed up picture of the area

Please don’t use gravel, especially white gravel. The extra reflection and heat retention makes the situation more difficult for many plants. And in my experience, keeping plants in pots healthy is more difficult than planting them. In the ground they don’t dry out as quickly and the temperature of the soil and roots will remain more even, so go ahead and plant them in the ground. If something doesn’t work out or you want to change the placement, you can move it.

To get specific plant suggestions for your area, check out the California forum or for hummingbird plants for your area, ask on the Hummingbird forum. Or there are a whole bunch of botanical gardens and great nurseries in the Bay Area where you can get ideas. You live in an area with a stunning range of plants available, so enjoy the time spent finding plants for your garden. If you want ideas from more than one place, check out some of your other local resources.

Thank You! I will look into that. i contacted them before and they did not recommend their Hummingbirds package. I guess I could order a few and see how the plant will do in our area.
Yes, I thought 30 plants are kinda too many for such a small area but the nursery said the plants don't grow that big!
I will definitely do more researches before commit.
thank you.

Salvia and Agastache are both hummingbird flowers, but you really need Bay Area recommendations to get the species that will be happiest around you, and there are a LOT of appropriate plants and places to go for suggestions locally, far more than most other areas of the country.

I should have been more clear! I am looking for more of suggestions on the style/layout for the planting bed. I will definitely do more researches for local/native species. I went to several local nurseries, they mostly recommended so many plants for the small area and I just want to make sure i have a proper layout and number of plants.

Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to suggest that particular hummer package, I was just showing some of the plants suggested. As said, you'll need to find the right plants for your zone/area. Re: layout and such....one thing to know if you're going to get into gardening.....plants have wheels! :)) I have had very few perennials or even shrubs that permanently landed where they began. I like a full look to a garden so I do plant close initially but I do it with the realization that I will have to move them in 1-2 yrs or so..depending. I love to experiment with new plants (it's a disease...:) so leaving a layout the same year after year is a foreign concept for me!

What plants are being recommended to you by the nurseries? You might not have to order anything if you can find things locally.

As far as layout....do you mean what goes where or?? One thing to realize of course is that your sun will diminish as that maple grows. Apparently it gets to 15-20' wide/tall so that would eventually shade most of the bed except for early/late sun that creeps under the canopy. I've never had a Jap maple so not sure how fast they grow. But it will simply mean enlarging the garden which is normally step #2 of this disease. :)

On to layout....This is pretty basic and maybe you know this but with a garden bed shape like yours that is viewed from all sides, you want to position your tallest plants in the center and then scale down in size towards the edges...for the most part. Your patio side will be the most important. Some plants will refuse to get with the program and will assert their independence in some way...usually staying too small or getting too big and too fast! But that's the fun of it.....moving, dividing, experimenting. Many online nurseries sell garden "packages" such as shade, butterfly gardens etc that give a good placement guides. You don't need to buy them but you can learn from them. There's the advice of planting in odd #'s that is always good to follow...usually with smaller plants.

So, tell us perhaps what's been recommended and then we can help with the particulars. Not everything needs to be a hummer plant ...what are some other favs? With the maple and water feature in there it's really not a huge space. What's at the end there in pots...staying, going? That fountain would look more natural with plants softening its edges and with something tall behind it as a backdrop.

The biggest temptation that we all go through when we begin gardening is to buy as many different plants (like 1 of everything...) as we can cuz we want variety and maximum flower power! Try to resist that if you can as it ends up a bonafide mess usually! White blooms and gray foliage (artemesias are wonderful but might not be for your zone) and ornamental grasses (Karl Foerster stays narrow) complement other colors/plants beautifully, a large leaf next to a small leaf variety lends interest, and you'll want varying bloom times to lend interest.

Anyways...let us know what has been suggested/what you like and we can pitch in with more specifics.

As Jama says, placement of tallest plants should be so that they are behind shorter ones from your usual perspective. As far as spacing, it depends a lot on what plants you choose. So in my gardens, the columbines only take up a circle about 6”-8”in diameter, while Salvia “Black and Blue” is a big perennial, 2’-3’ wide and tall. My native honeysuckle, Lonicera sempervirens can be over 15’ tall and will be wider than the trellis that supports it. So you will have to figure spacing and numbers of plants depending on what plants you choose.

Jama7 & NHBabs - thank you for a very informative feedbackss. It is my 1st attempt at this so there are many things I will surely learn along the way!
I understand the Japanese Maple will get very large but I am intend to prune and keeping it smaller to fit the space for now. Also, the sun is on the right side of the maple so most of the shade will be on the lawn.
Anyhow, here is the latest recommendations from a local nursery. They are specialized in native California species and appears to know what they are doing. I told them I would like colors/texture for most of the time and these are their recommendations.
All of the plants are smaller so they were able to squeeze 8 species (total of 21 plants).
I think I will go ahead and proceed with this and will adjust as needed later on.
Yes, Jama7! I am starting to find that gardening is somewhat addicted;-) Especially with my 5 years old son's "helps";-)

That's great. The nursery seems to go the extra mile for their customers. Impressive that they take the time to sketch the layout for you. Well, get down and dirty, have fun and take some pix when you've got it all in!