Viburnums

Viburnums cover two separate jobs, and the job you have decides which plant belongs in the cart. The evergreen sweet viburnums are fast, dense hedging and screening stock, with glossy leaves, growth that holds down to the ground, and the clipping tolerance to be held anywhere from a 1.5m boundary hedge to a 4m screen. They carry scented white flowers as well, but the leaf is the reason to plant them. The deciduous types are grown for the spring flower display, with leaf colour after it in autumn, and belong where both can be seen. Pick evergreen for a year-round green wall, deciduous for the flowers.

Sweet Viburnum - Viburnum odoratissimum is the usual screening choice and carries the widest size range here, 100mm starter pots through to 45L advanced plants. It suits warm and temperate gardens; heavy frost burns the foliage. Sweet Viburnum - Viburnum odoratissimum Emerald Lustre is a named form of the same species, with larger, glossier foliage and more even growth, to 20L. Laurustinus - Viburnum tinus is the cool-climate evergreen, with smaller leaves and white flower clusters through the colder months. It suits a low to mid-height clipped hedge rather than a tall screen, and it sets seed that birds carry, so keep it clipped near bushland. Sandankwa Viburnum - Viburnum suspensum is slower and more compact, the pick for a hedge held under 2m, and runs to 45L. Viburnum Coppertop PBR is a third evergreen, grown for bronze new growth that colours up after every trim. For flowers, Japanese Snowball - Viburnum plicatum Mariesii holds flat white flower tiers along horizontal branches in spring, stocked from 200mm to 70L.

The evergreens take full sun to part shade. The Japanese snowball wants morning sun and shelter from hot afternoon sun inland, or the leaves scorch. All of them want soil that drains. Space sweet viburnums 800mm to 1m apart for a screen, or 500mm to 700mm for a tighter clipped hedge and for Sandankwa and Laurustinus. Water deeply through the first two summers and keep mulch off the trunks. Once established, clip twice a year, in early spring and again after the summer flush, taking a little each time rather than cutting back into bare wood. Time Laurustinus differently: it carries flower buds over autumn, so make the main clip straight after flowering and keep later trims light.

The thing that ruins these hedges is leaving them unpruned for the first two years. A young viburnum that is never tipped puts everything into height, and by the time the tops have closed over at 3m the lower stems have shaded themselves out and dropped their leaves, so you get a screen that is solid at head height and see through at knee height. Start tipping in the first season, while the plants still look too small to be worth the trouble. Old bare wood will re-shoot, but it costs a season or two.

Still weighing options for the same job? The hedges and privacy screening collections set viburnum against lilly pilly and the other dense evergreens, while flowering covers the spring display shrubs that compete with the snowball types. Every order ships farm-direct with flat $99 delivery across QLD, NSW, VIC, SA, ACT and WA, a $399 minimum order, and the 30-Day Healthy Plant Guarantee.