Hi,
My wife and I have lived in Altamonte Springs (Orlando) for a few
years and are slowly getting into the process of redeveloping our 2/3
acre corner lot. The place has enormous potential, especially with 25
- 30 various oak trees giving us lots of natural shade and beauty, but
the gardens need a ton of work. In years gone by they were quite
lovely with azaleas everywhere, but the Azaleas grew quite leggy
(since pruned back down) our fish pond is surrounded by a jungle of
ferns, the garden beds are choaked with weeds, and all in all we have
a few good years ahead of us wipping everything into shape!

One of the chief things that we want to address is the fact we are on
a corner block that is quite busy at times thanks to the fact we are
on a short cut between a couple of very busy roads. With kids and all
we want to try and create a barrier or buffer both for safety and for
privacy, and we seem a little limited in what we can do thanks to
local city ordnance. As it stands the corner is quite open, a very
large area of lawn in fact, and we intent to safeguard our children
and our home to start with by putting up a fence along the property
line. What we then propose to do is put some short & plain shrubs for
decorative effect on the streetside of the corner fence, and then try
and create a barrier to 6 - 8 feet in height on our side. We had
thought of a simple hedge, but the city has told us that hedges have
to be pruned to the requisite 2 1/2 feet if they're along the fence
line, so we figure on getting around it with short trees and shrubs!
(oddly enough we know of at least four or five houses in the area that
have very high hedges along the fence line facing the road, but why
tempt fate by trying to get away with it ourselves?) We've been
playing with the idea of a height combination of Azaleas, elephant
ears, and maybe even palmetto palms, though we're not sure of the
aesthetics of the latter with a backdrop of so many oaks and spanish
moss! Closer to the ground we'll put a line of some more decorative
plants as the border.

I'd be interested to know what kind of suggestions people here might
have for a combination of plants that could work effectively for us as
a barrier, bearing in mind Florida weather that occasionally hits us
with just enough frost to wipe out delicate tropical plants. The area
in question is actually the only spot on our property that gets a
great deal of sun duruing the day, so any plants would have to be able
to tolerate that. The depth of the bed on our side of the fence will
be 20 feet in a crecent shape, and it's length around corner about 60
- 80 feet.

We inherited our own well and a good sprinkler system when we bought
the property, but given that we're pretty conciencous about water
conservation we would have a preference for plants that need little
watering once established, and to that end I've thought that a few
plants from my Australian homeland might work well in such a sunny
spot.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.