A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2004 Hedges and screens questions

I have a front lawn that sits useless and which I plan to turn into a garden area, surrounded by a 6ft hedge. Can anyone help me discover what type of hedge fulfills the following criteria?:

-doesn't need to much watering
-grows relatively fast
-somewhat dense, but with less formal edges than your conventional boxwood or privet
-Would make a good screener hedge, surrounding a 1000 sq.foot garden area on three sides.
-needs little upkeep, and won't get all leggy
-has non-invasive roots, and is disease resistant.

I have this way too long list of hedges, and can't make heads nor tails of it! Can anyone help me get the list to one or two options, or offer an even better idea?:

Fraser's photinia (Photinia fraseri)
Hopseed (Dodonaea viscosa)
Surinam cherry
Pineapple guava (Feijoa sellowiana)
Pittosporum (Pittosporum tobira)
Privet (Ligustrum spp.)
Viburnum, Laurustinus (Viburnum tinus)
Sandankwa Viburnum,
Eugenia compacta,
Eugenia myrtifolia,
Green Cocoplum
Abelia Grandiflora
Burning Bush
Fragrant Honeysuckle
Rosa Rugosa
Flowering Currant 'Ribes sanguineum Pulborough Scarlet'
Portuguese Laurel 'Prunus lusitanica'

The only one on your list that I have experience with is Burning Bush. I have the dwarf variety that only gets about 6' tall x wide.
It grows fairly fast, I only trim mine once a year to give it shape.(I planted mine as a barrier/privacy screen along my front yard, as my neighbors grandkids kept coming into my yard to play. They said my grass was softer???) As for the root system, I have never had a problem with it. It is quite easy to take care of. Mine are thriving and I am in the Heat of Georgia.
Plus you get the added interest of not only the flame red foliage in the fall, but the square stems as well. They do need good sun though, in case that is an issue.

On a second thought, man, that hurt the brain, two thoughts in 5 minutes . If you are not wanting a solid privacy hedge, there are varieties of crepe myrtles that only grow about 6 foot tall, and you would have a blooming hedge all summer long, in a variety of colors if you wished. You only have to cut them back once a year in the spring, so the new growth will come on.

Ok, now I have Excederin headache # 30000001, just plain thinking to much . If you do not mind decidous plants for your hedge, maybe some mock orange (you can not believe the great fragrance the blooms give off in the spring). Another idea would be either the Weeping or Variegated versions of Wegelia???(Can not remember how to spell it)

You must have a veritable migraine after all that great advise! Thanks, and sorry to give you pains in the noggin'...I liked your first idea, about the burning bush, as I would prefer some sort of privacy screen. Question: You mentioned that it grows 6 feet tall and wide, but can one trim it so it grows 6 feet tall, but only about 2-3 feet wide?

Yes, you can keep it trimmed any way you like it, I let mine grow together for the privacy issue, and only trim the front and back. I keep it about 3 foot deep. Just about the width of the bed I have where they are planted, so I can still mow past them in the yard. Did that make any sense???

Made excellent sense, thank you!

Nicholas,
How's the front yard coming along???
Any pictures yet??
Weezie

The people up the street have a lilac hedge - I always look twice at it, thinking it's those other purple clusters that look like lilacs - but nope - it's lilacs.

How did they get it going? Dunno'.

lilac hedges are easy to create. lilacs grow suckers up from the ground next to the mother plant. All you have to do is dig up the suckers and plant them in rows. It'll take a while, but eventually, it will be a hedge!

You might even be able to sweet-talk the people up the street into letting you remove the suckers from their lilacs. If you're not too greedy and promise to fill the holes back in, they may be happy to have theirs thinned. You may be able to get a free hedge and some garden friends in with the deal!

Hey gang! Weezie was sweet enough to send me a polite kick in the a**, and I realize that I never followed up on this posting! Well, the reason I've not been too much in evidence on the boards is because I've been busy finally making the dream a reality: The front of the house is all done:

Day one we (my wife and I) pulled out the front lawn - 11 tons of earth and dead grass!! We Rounduped everything, and then called in the experts...

Day two had a sprinkler company install new sprinklers, and excavate the center 800 sq.feet of the 1200 sq. foot plot down to a 3.5 inch depth. So now we had sprinklers in, and a hard earth mound all around the edge at 5-6 feet width from the sides. In the middle was a lower level (by 3.5 inches), ready for filling with the gravel...I had designed a courtyard setup (can you picture it, or have my descriptive powers gone the way of my fingernails in this past month?... )

Spent the next week or two watering the earth to see if any grass or weed seed had survived the roundup. Then went and picked up two truckloads of compost and shoveled that onto the edging planting beds (the previously mentioned 5-6 wide mounds). Rented an enormous rototiller, and tried to churn up 50-year old packed clay soil, with some success…

Then what...lemme see...oh yes! The sprinkler guys came back and helped put in the gravel. Had 10 tons of 3/4 gravel trucked in and 10 tons of pea gravel to go on top of that. We put in 5" high Black Diamond edging all around the central "dip", and then wheelbarrowed in the 3/4 gravel, raking it all across the space to a depth of about 1.5 inches. We then rolled that down, and then raked 1.5 inches of the pea gravel on top. Now the courtyard was done. I painted the banister and pillar (which are wrought iron) by the front door, and got ready for the final stage:

With your help, I’ve been researching potential plants for a lonnnng time now, and finally went to the nursery to pick up my selections:

50 Pittosporum to create a hedge all around the edge
several flats of Alyssum to sit at the base of the hedge and hide the "feet of the bushes"
a couple of flats of Snapdragons on the inside of the hedge line
A Bailey's Acacia tree
A Red Plum tree
A Xitalpa tree
A Crepe Myrtle (which I'm not sure will survive - seems a little dead)
A flat of Coleus
A few Dusty Millers
Some Butterfly Bushes
Daylilies of various shades
Penstemon
Agapanthus
Dianthus
Vinca Minor
Liriope
Pampas Grass
Zebra Grass
Russian Sage
Blue Star


I also transplanted from the back garden: A Peach tree, which I planted in a large pot, and 20 or so irises...

The day after I planted everything (and boy did the muscles complain!) it began pouring for the first time this year. This was 3 days ago, and it hasn't stopped since!! I'm worried the newly planted and transplanted flowers, bushes, et al will drown, but I'm just keeping my fingers crossed and hoping…

btw, I posted this reply in Landscape trials as well, under "Need ideas for front of House!". In the interest of not avoiding two similar discussion forums, I invite you to continue this chat there, if that's not inconvenient, Here\'s the link...I think