Screening plants that actually work on the Sunshine Coast

Privacy is the most common request we get, and screening is where the most money gets wasted. The wrong species, planted too close, fed too little, gives you 2 good years and then a hedge full of holes.

Here is what we actually plant, after 15 years of watching what survives.

The reliable workhorses

Lilly pilly, the right ones. Resilience and Backyard Bliss shrug off psyllids that disfigure older varieties. Dense, glossy, fast without being reckless, and they take shaping beautifully. Our default for a clipped screen between 1.5 and 4 metres.

Viburnum odoratissimum. The fast classic for a reason. Big soft leaves, quick cover, happy on the coast and in the hinterland. Needs room to breathe and a proper trim 2 to 3 times a year or it gets leggy.

Murraya. Tight, fragrant, tidy. Slower than viburnum but holds a crisp face like nothing else, and the flowering is a bonus. Wants sun and decent drainage.

Bangalow palms in groves. Not a hedge, but for filtered height above a fence line in a subtropical garden, a staggered grove of bangalows gives privacy where hedges cannot reach.

What we quietly avoid

Leighton Green and other conifers brown out in our humidity. Bamboo solves one problem and creates 3, even the clumping kinds need real commitment. And anything planted at 30cm spacings to look instant: crowded screens fail from the inside within 5 years.

The part everyone skips

A screen is a row of trees being asked to behave like a wall. That only works with preparation: improved soil along the whole run, not just the planting holes, irrigation for the first 2 summers, and a feeding rhythm. Plant a 3 metre screen properly and it is there in 2 to 3 years. Plant it cheap and you will plant it twice.

If you are staring at a neighbour's new second storey right now, we design and plant screens that fit the space, the soil and the patience you actually have.