Re. Olive understory

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Hi Pamela, Fran, and David,

Thanks for your help!

Here in metro Los Angeles, olives are almost all ornamental, yet most are to my eye savagely pruned, both crown-reduced and thinned, as they might be in a commercial orchard. Sometimes they're even trimmed into topiary poodles.

Occasionally you will see a less fastidious homeowner leave them alone, and to me it makes a much more ornamental tree, a dense rounded crown of silvery green foliage.  This is the look I like.

My olives (allegedly fruitless, though last year's crop would come in handy in a famine), are spaced about 4-5 meters apart around an open space, so I look forward to an eventual enclosed canopy of interlaced trees.  Given the density of shade this will create, I'd guess from your responses that an under-story of low herbaceous plants would work better than shrubs that might stretch to find the light.  I probably will have to irrigate more often to sustain the low ground-covers as well.

Thanks again, any more advice is always welcome!

-Ben A-W

PS  Fran, your home town has a delightful name!