What Can I Plant Next to a Fence? How to Make a Fence Disappear Without Losing Half the Garden

Fences are funny things. We spend a small fortune putting them up and then almost immediately start looking for plants to hide them.

Usually the brief goes something like this: I want something along the fence, but I don't want a hedge. Fair enough. The problem is that we tend to approach the solution exactly as though we were planting a hedge anyway. We buy a row of tall shrubs, space them evenly from one end to the other, and wait for the fence to disappear behind a second, greener fence.

There’s nothing wrong with that if screening is actually what you need. But if the real problem is simply that you have twenty metres of Colorbond staring back at you every time you walk outside, there are much more interesting ways to deal with it.

A fence gives you something extremely useful in garden design: a backdrop. Once you stop thinking of it as something that must be completely covered, you can use plants to break it up, soften it, frame parts of it and pull your eye away from it. Often that takes fewer plants, less maintenance and considerably less garden space than planting a continuous hedge.

And before we choose a single plant, there’s one thing worth doing.

Work out what the fence is actually doing to the garden

Go outside at different times of day and have a proper look at it. A north-facing fence and a west-facing fence can create very different growing conditions. Some fences reflect a surprising amount of heat. Others cast long shadows. The soil immediately beside them can be dry because rain doesn't always reach it properly, particularly where nearby buildings, eaves or dense vegetation interfere. Airflow may be limited, and depending on what lies beyond the fence, roots from neighbouring plants may already be competing for moisture.

This is why “what can I plant along a fence?” doesn't have one useful answer. The fence is only part of the story. Sun, heat, soil, moisture, available width and what you actually want the plants to achieve are far more important.

The other thing I'd measure is the garden bed itself. Not the width you wish it was. The actual usable width between the fence and the lawn, driveway, path or whatever else is there.

A two-metre-deep bed gives us plenty to play with. A 600mm strip does not. And planting something naturally two metres wide into that 600mm strip because “we'll keep it trimmed” is exactly how gardening turns into unpaid weekend employment.

You probably don't need to hide every centimetre

This is one of those things that's much easier to see once somebody points it out.

Imagine a long plain fence behind a garden. If we completely cover it with one species, we have solved the fence problem, but we've also created one enormous wall of foliage. Sometimes that's exactly right, particularly where privacy is important. But if privacy isn't the main issue, leaving glimpses of the fence between groups of planting can actually give the garden more depth.

Your eye starts looking at the plants rather than the boundary.

A taller plant here, another repeated further along, a broad lower shrub beneath it and some softer foliage moving through the front can be enough to visually break a long fence into smaller sections. Suddenly you're looking at a garden with a fence behind it rather than a fence with plants lined up in front of it.

That's a surprisingly important distinction.

If the bed is narrow, choose a narrow plant

This is where plants such as Callistemon Slim™ start making an awful lot of sense. If you need useful height but don't have the room for a naturally broad shrub, an upright growth habit can give you vertical greenery without consuming half the yard.

The same principle applies to Space Saver™ Melaleuca, Thin Fence™ Viburnum and Straight & Narrow™. They're different plants with different requirements and characteristics, but the reason they become useful in tight gardens is similar: their shape does more of the work for you.

I think this is something home gardeners are getting much better at. For years, the default answer to a narrow boundary seemed to be planting a conventional hedge and then relentlessly pruning its sides. But if a plant naturally wants to become three metres wide and you have one metre available, you're going to spend the life of that plant correcting it.

Pruning should help us shape a plant. It shouldn't be the only thing standing between the garden and complete plant domination.

Choose the shape first.

Don't forget you've got a vertical surface sitting there

Sometimes the best plant beside a fence isn't a screening shrub at all.

It's a climber.

If garden-bed width is limited, using the vertical plane can give you an enormous amount of green without taking up much ground space. Star Jasmine is an obvious example because, in suitable conditions and with proper support, it can cover a fence while bringing fragrant flowers into the garden. Pandorea gives you another option, and Hardenbergia can work beautifully where the conditions and desired effect suit it.

But there's an important distinction here: climbers climb things. They don't magically understand that you want them distributed beautifully across seventeen square metres of fence.

They need appropriate support and usually some guidance, particularly while establishing. Depending on the plant and fence type, that may mean wires, trellis or another support system installed with enough separation and strength for the mature plant.

It's worth doing properly because a green vertical surface can completely change a small garden. Instead of sacrificing a metre or more of garden depth to screening shrubs, you've effectively moved the greenery upwards.

Meema™ is interesting because it doesn't have to behave like a climber

Hardenbergia Meema™ is one of those plants that becomes much more useful once you understand its growth habit rather than simply reading “Hardenbergia” on the label.

It develops as a shrubby, spreading groundcover rather than behaving exactly like the scrambling Hardenbergia people may picture. Left to spread, it can cover substantial ground. Give it something to interact with and its growth can also create beautiful informal movement around structures.

That makes it useful in a fence garden where you don't necessarily want everything upright. You might have taller structural planting breaking up the fence and then Meema moving through the lower layer rather than another row of medium-height shrubs.

This is the bit of garden design I wish people played with more. Height isn't the only way to hide something. Sometimes width and layering do a better job.

A plant spreading across the ground pulls your eye forward. A taller plant pulls it upward. A climber takes it across the vertical plane. Put those forms together and suddenly the fence becomes the least interesting thing in the picture.

Westringia can do several completely different jobs in the same problem

This is why I keep coming back to cultivars rather than just plant names.

Someone asks whether Westringia is suitable beside a fence and the answer is almost meaningless until we know which Westringia and what job we're giving it.

A compact plant such as Grey Box™ can give you evergreen structure through the middle of a planting. Low Horizon™ stays much lower and spreads, so its job might be covering the foreground and softening the edge of the bed. Mundi™ gives you another broader, spreading form.

Same general group of plants. Completely different jobs.

This is one of the easiest ways to make a planting look more sophisticated without actually making it more complicated. You don't need fifteen plant varieties. You need a few growth habits that work together.

One upright. One compact. One spreading. Perhaps something strappy moving between them.

You've already got a garden.

A fence garden is a brilliant place for repetition

Long, narrow garden beds have one big advantage: they practically tell you how to design them.

Repeat.

If you've got a fifteen-metre fence, don't feel obliged to find fifteen interesting plants. Choose a few plants that work and let them appear again.

Perhaps Callistemon Slim™ provides height at intervals rather than forming a continuous hedge. Grey Box™ repeats underneath and between them. Little Jess™ Improved Dianella runs through sections of the foreground. A groundcover connects parts of the planting.

The exact combination will depend on the site, but the principle is the useful bit.

When the same plant appears again several metres away, your eye connects those spaces. The garden starts feeling like one composition instead of a collection of things bought on different Saturdays.

And yes, buying plants on different Saturdays is exactly how most of us actually garden. The trick is occasionally buying the same one again.

Hot fences deserve special attention

If the boundary receives afternoon sun, go and touch the fence on a hot summer day.

Not for long, obviously.

Some fencing materials can become extremely hot and radiate that heat straight back into the planting. The little strip beside a western boundary may therefore be much harsher than another full-sun garden bed only a few metres away.

This is where plants adapted to hot, exposed conditions become useful. Blue Horizon™ Eremophila, ThrivR™ Eremophila, selected Westringias, Lomandras and other heat-tolerant plants may be worth considering depending on your climate, soil and drainage.

And don't forget the roots.

A plant can tolerate hot foliage conditions and still struggle because the soil around a fence is bone dry. Newly planted tubes have small root systems and need proper establishment watering even when you've deliberately chosen drought-tolerant species.

“Drought tolerant once established” remains one of the most important little phrases on a plant label.

The last three words are doing a lot of work.

Shade along a fence is a completely different garden

At the opposite end, you might have a fence line that receives very little direct sun.

Please don't solve that by buying the same plants you saw thriving against somebody else's sunny front fence.

A shaded boundary may suit plants such as Liriope, Mondo, Native Violet, Star Jasmine or other shade-tolerant plants depending on exactly how much light reaches the area and your local conditions.

And “shade” itself needs a little unpacking. Bright filtered light is different from deep shade between two buildings. Morning sun followed by shade is different from a permanently dark southern side passage.

Plants don't read the word “shade” on their label and consider the matter settled.

Look at the actual site.

What if there's barely any soil?

This happens constantly beside fences, particularly around newer homes.

You dig down and discover approximately eleven centimetres of something vaguely resembling topsoil followed by compacted subsoil, rubble and what appears to be half the original building site.

Don't ignore it.

Roots need somewhere to go.

Before spending hundreds of dollars on plants, work out what you're planting into. Compaction can restrict root growth and water movement. Poor drainage can be just as problematic as dry soil. Simply digging a small beautiful hole, filling it with lovely soil and dropping a plant into it doesn't necessarily fix the surrounding conditions.

You want roots moving beyond the original planting hole.

That's establishment.

The plant isn't really established because it's been in the ground for six months. It's established when its root system has begun colonising the soil around it and the plant is functioning in the landscape rather than living inside the dimensions of its old pot.

Groundcovers make fence gardens feel wider

This is one of my favourite tricks for narrow beds.

If every plant grows upright, the whole planting can look like a skinny strip pressed against the boundary.

Let something come forward.

Purple Fusion™ Scaevola, Yareena™ Myoporum, Aussie Rambler™, Low Horizon™ or another suitable spreading plant can move towards the lawn or path and blur the front edge.

That visually increases the depth of the planting because your eye no longer sees one strict line running parallel to the fence.

Obviously you still need to choose something appropriate for the conditions and keep pedestrian access clear, but a little controlled spill is often exactly what a narrow garden needs.

The fence is straight.

The bed is straight.

The path is straight.

The house is probably straight.

The plants don't all have to be.

Leave yourself enough room to maintain the fence

This is the spectacularly boring section that future you will appreciate.

Fences occasionally need repairing, painting, replacing or accessing. Services can run along boundaries. Neighbours occasionally need access. Plants grow through gaps and over tops. Climbers become heavier as they mature.

Think about all of that before planting.

Also check local requirements where relevant, particularly around boundaries, pools, retaining structures, utilities and any situation where vegetation could interfere with access or safety.

A beautiful planting isn't particularly successful if the electrician has to excavate it six months later.

Sometimes leaving a little access is the cleverest landscaping decision you'll make.

So what should you actually plant next to a fence?

Start with the problem rather than the plant.

If you need privacy and the bed is narrow, look for plants with naturally narrow, upright habits. If you simply want to soften an ugly fence, consider groups of taller plants rather than automatically creating a continuous screen. If space is extremely tight, investigate climbers and vertical planting. If the bed is broad enough, layer compact shrubs, strappy foliage and spreading groundcovers in front.

Then choose according to sunlight, soil, drainage, climate and mature size.

That sounds less exciting than me giving you a list of ten miracle plants.

It's also considerably more likely to work.

Because the best plant beside a fence isn't the plant that grows fastest or gets tallest.

It's the one that can do the job without becoming the next problem.

A fence can actually make a garden better

I know. That's a big call for something usually selected from a catalogue of slightly different shades of Colorbond.

But a fence gives a garden a boundary, and boundaries can be useful. They give climbers somewhere to grow, foliage something to contrast against and planting a backdrop that makes its shapes easier to see.

You don't necessarily need to make the fence disappear.

Plant something tall enough to interrupt it. Let another plant spread in front. Repeat a few good performers. Bring the planting forward in places and allow it to recede in others. Use the fence rather than spending the next decade fighting to conceal every last centimetre.

Eventually, something interesting happens.

You stop noticing the fence.

Not because it's completely gone.

Because the garden in front of it has become much more interesting to look at.