Gardenscout, Thanks for your suggestion. I agree that Virburnum is a beautiful shrub. We have some at the other end of our property, in full sun. It looks great. Somehow I did not know it would do well in shade. I should have asked my question earlier. I got three Pittsoporum today that I will plant tomorrow. Thanks for taking the time to help.

Hi Judy! We need dense screening from a golf field on the other side of our wooded area. Actually, not even so much the golf course but the golf balls that seem to fly our way. We get hundreds and hundreds of them a year. It's become dangerous to stand in that part of the yard if there are golfers around. We had a meeting with the golf course management and their response was to put a full time official "guard" on duty on their side of this part of our wooded area to "protect people". So now when we go back there and if there are golfers, he tells us to please stand back or not stand there because a golf ball may come our way. Although I appreciate the golf course's neighborly efforts, perhaps they should have hired someone to train their golfers to play better instead! Lol! They can't put up a fence either and and it's quite an expense to hire someone. I would rather plant something, anything really, as a privacy and protection barrier. That's why I need them to be at least 6' tall and as dense as possible. No screening in the winter would be ok because there are no golfers around then anyway. The advantage to evergreen screening is early Spring protection but we could live without it. We only need to screen about a 12' wide area, this is where they seem to come in mostly. We used to have good screening from all the noxious weeds and weed trees we had back there but we've removed them because they were constantly spreading into our flower beds and grass from the billions of seeds. We'd like to replace them with something else. Although it's an excellent idea, we can't do a fence as fences are not allowed by our city. We also have a hungry deer problem and arborviates don't work here. We've tried them. So now you see our dilemma and why we are desperately in need of help!

I should have been more clear, the hedge isn't mine, I just bought some bare root "sticks" from a near by county. I found that photo while searching for pics of rugosa hedges when considering doing it here. I'm waiting for mine to start breaking their buds and get to growing! Of course, being right next to the lake, it's not as warm here as inland, I don't think it's been warmer than MAYBE 60, but probably in the 50's still. Ha, I hear you regarding Toronto traffic. The QEW makes my hair stand on end. We got a wild hair last year to drive around the lake (Ontario) one day, don't ask me why...but the traffic in that particular area certainly contributed to making for a LONG day. Won't be doing THAT again! Rugosa are pretty tough from my understanding as far as growing conditions, they're also called Beach Roses because they'll grow in sand. They don't like being sprayed or fussed at from what I've heard so they aren't what you're thinking of as a "typical" rose. I have some well established Damask here that are the same way-I know for at least 10 years no one watered, trimmed, mulched, sprayed or even weeded around them. They wouldn't make a good hedge I don't think though. I tried finding Rugosa at nurseries around us, and only one, about an hour away had them. We were int he area so I stopped in-they couldn't even tell me if they were species or a hybrid, and they wanted $25 per plant. Since there are pretty variable heights and bloom times, I opted to wait. Luckily I found out the one county has a sale every spring with various bare root shrubs and trees, so I picked them up from them (10 for $10). I'm not sure all of them will end up viable or not, but it was less for 10 tries knowing they were the species than 1 unknown plant. If not for the winds, I'd try a BUNCH of Queen O The Lakes (just because I love that name) or other easier roses (I have a Queen O the Lakes and it was fine with no spraying, etc last year-I just planted Peace, hopefully it will be like my Peace at my old house and also not need much fussing)-or some other way easier to find rose variety. Hopefully my rugosa fill in and look like that hedge though! This post was edited by eclecticcottage on Thu, May 2, 13 at 16:47

We grow hops as an effective screen. Its deciduous however, so it doesn't provide a screening throughout the year, and it needs good support (something to twine onto as it grows). I wonder if you could somehow tie a high, taught rope across the area you want to screen, and hang twine down from that high, horizontal support. The vines will grow up string, but the system of support will need to be stout, as the vines weigh a ton (vigorous plants are loaded with water). Hops are a perennial vine. They will die back to the ground each fall. I cut the old vines down each fall or spring before any new growth starts coming onto the trellis I grow them up. They seem to grow about 6 inches a day during their most vigorous period of spring growth. Lovely leaves. Our plants often get aphids which can be remedied with some timely applications of sprayed on insecticidal soap. Hops is such a strong grower that it can be invasive - spreading to take over garden beds and chocking out other plants. Keep an eye on it and make sure you keep it in bounds (maybe even destroying it if you are moving out/away from your current domicile). We use it to screen our back patio. We don't use the patio until summer (for evening meals and such). Before then it is pretty much too cold to sit outside in the early evenings. By the time the weather has heated up and we are sitting there the hops have grown up and created our summer screen. Works great. We enjoy the look of the hops (fruit of the plant) that grows and ripens in the fall. We don't use them to brew beer, but just enjoy how they look, and when they are dry they can be crushed between your fingers to give off a lovely fragrance. I bet they would be a nice addition to a potpourri.