Dear Kate_Rose,
If you want stately trees...Texas Ash, Hackberry sound good.What about Bigtooth Maple, Escarpment black cherry(Sounds good), Texas Walnut, Evergreen Sumac, or Carolina buckthorn.Can you grow Anacua (Ehretia anacua)?Oaks so common & dominant.TX Madrone only feeds 3 birds.

Good Luck,
ALberto1444

Dear Kate_rose,
Many Junipers, & oaks grow there. Cottonwood support wild Turkey.The 1st choices 4 Hill Country don't sound so bad either. I forgot about Texas Pistachio & American Ash.

Alberto1444

Well the reason I had narrowed it down to these 2 is because I wanted an evergreen.

Oaks are dominant but this is a really cool one that stays relatively small & is pretty rare in the wild. The madrone would remind me of home & I like the airness of the canopy and it also would probably stay pretty small here at the edge of its range.

My significant other has nixed the juniper idea & we are too dry for cottonwoods (besides no turkeys in town). I don't think the pistachio will grow here or anacua. I have considered ash (useful as a butterfly hostplant). I have a bunch of aromatic sumac that I started from seed that will go in. Texas walnut is too allelopathic for my small yard. I am putting in some Prunus already (virginiana & possibly mexicana).

Is there a specific reason you would reccomend against the madrone?? Which 3 birds does it feed?

I would be planting it under one of my pecans hopefully to replace it someday so that the native prarie I have put in will get less shade.