Oooh - I like those suggestions but I am bummed about plumeria. Although they definitely make the list of favorite plants and I have tried to grow many over the years, they never really grow for me. Rather, they all have remained sad, stick-like figures for years - sometimes with a branch or 2 - with a small tuft of leaves
and, when I was lucky, 3 or 4 flowers per year. The plumeria didn't even grow taller - they just remained frozen in time. When I was in Maui years ago, I saw what they are suppose to look like and, well, I have come to the conclusion that they either don't like me or they don't like our climate. But I sure do admire thosefolks that can grow them!
Bananas actually seem to do okay here. I tried planting a dwarf banana tree as a test plant many years ago and it is still with us. My son had a dog at the time (Sebs, the dog, passed away a few years back) that dug up the banana every single day - without fail. He never bothered any other plant in the yard except for that one banana. We finally had to block the tree off and, once it was allowed to be in the ground for more than a few hours, it did well. That surprised me as, by that time, it looked really, really sad - a limp rag with very little root. We have managed to get a few bunches of bananas over the years - I am sure not as many as other people get as our climate is very hot and we get strong winds off the desert annually - but the tree is quite robust so I am happy.
Thank you so much for the suggestions - I will definitely look in to adding a Bird of Paradise.
