Native Hedge

Hi all,

Almost finishing up the landscaping on the front yard and have a couple of trees to choose. We have an Agonis Flexuosa after dark as a slight feature tree in the front garden. I am trying to look for a native to plant along the fence line that can be maintained at around head height.

Couple of requirements/limitations
[1] The house faces east and the hedge will be planted along the north fence, so the fence casts a shadow over where the plant will be
[2] Has to be native (not willing to budge) - must grow well in Melbourne
[3] Dense and lush green (can have tinges of other colours on leaves)
[4]Flowering or non flowering
[3] Not essential but I would like to attract native birds, we have a massive Indian Myna problem in our area and as much as I would like to get rid of them, I don't believe in killing them. So I will do my best to attract some natives, however the Indian Myna might scare away any native birds that do decide to come.

Bottle brush was high on the list, but we had one at our old house (which we neglected: never watered, never trimmed) and as expected it looked like sh*t. Bad photo: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/94/bottleo.png/
It wasnt very green,looked dry (not lush), and had lots of holes (not dense) BUT boy did the honey eaters love it. It was planted in a small hole 30x30cm cut out of the concrete driveway, so soil was not great.

Reading these forums I came across this picture: http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i18/k ... nhedge.jpg and it looks nice, but it looks like there is a tree planted right behind it, giving it a more denser look that it actually is.

So I wanted to know if anyone had any photos of a bottle brush hedge and any comments on them.

Otherwise any recommendations for alternatives? Another flexuosa would look good with the after dark tree, but no idea what breed to go for. Was looking at the nana variety.

You can use virtually any Australian shrub. The tags won't say "suitable for hedging" so just do it anyway. You'll love what can be created. Grevillea look good and are less messy than Calistemon

You can choose anything really

Correa, Westringea are a couple I can think of right now. All you want is a good set of shears to make your choice do what you want it to do, not what the plant wants to.