Living in NC, it is curious you would need to order a southern magnolia........I would think most NC nurseries would carry them. Have you tried searching by botanical name and with a specific cultivar in mind? Southern magnolia, Magnolia grandiflora, comes in a range of sizes, from quite compact to enormous and with various attributes so no, not all southern magnolias are created equal.

Audubon is not a specific cultivar of magnolia but just the generic southern magnolia being pushed as a wildlife attractant by the Audubon Society. And with an unnecessarily higher price tag.

"is Nature Hills a reputable nursery?" No!! It gets terrible reviews and is one of a handful of nurseries no serious gardener ever patronizes.

ps, I just did a quick Google search of Greensboro area nurseries and all 3 I checked (there were tons more) had some form of Magnolia grandiflora in stock.

This nursery has beautiful magnolias available:

https://www.adcocksnursery.com/

@gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9), I'm actually about an hour from Greensboro, I just listed that because it's the closest city in the same zone that people will have heard of. I have one local nursery, but they're kinda crappy and literally every plant that I've bought from them (except for one) has died!

I have a small Ford Ranger that I can use to haul smaller plants, but a tree would require something taller and covered. If I'm going to the trouble of borrowing or renting something and having to drive an hour to get it, I'm better off just having it delivered.

After some research, though, it looks like my better option is a "Little Gem" dwarf Southern Magnolia. I found it on Adcock's, @Dig Doug's Designs, but... $500!! :-O

https://www.adcocksnursery.com/plants_details/plant/3561066/45g-Little-Gem-Southern-Magnolia

What do you think about Pixies Gardens? What they have is younger, but considerably less expensive:

https://www.pixiesgardens.com/products/little-gem-dwarf-magnolia-elegance-and-beauty-huge-fragrant-white-flowers-blooms-for-long-time-good-for-smaller-places?_pos=1&_sid=103d762aa&_ss=r&variant=30343998799956

FWIW, @Dig Doug's Designs, I'm running with what you sent me in this thread:

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6208377/new-garden-design-to-hide-neighbors

I've had loggers out here for the last month removing trees and cleaning things up; they're loading the logs today, so I'll be able to start mulching and planting next week :-)

I have the Cryptomeria Radicans, and I was gonna order the Siberian Spruce and Southern Magnolia to be delivered next week. My budget for the two combined is $300, though, so I might have to hold off on the Magnolia if it's gonna be $500 by itself.

$250 for a six foot Little Gem here. And they’re not as common as in the US.

I have fit more landscape plants in a small Ford Ranger than you could plant on your entire five acres.

My concern was more along the lines of driving down 421 at 70mph with a little tree in the back. I was afraid that the wind could damage it.

There's also the issue of gas, though... at $4, it'll cost more in gas to drive to Greensboro than to pay for shipping! Not to mention that I don't know where I'll find the time to take a half a day off for it.

@floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK, I'm finding them for cheaper on other sites, but every time I ask it turns out that they're a crap nursery! LOL

Do you have a local Lowes, Home Depot, Tractor Supply. or even a Walmart. If you are careful you can get some good trees at these placed. We have two lovely little Cherries, that we bought at a good price at Tractor Supply several years ago. This year they were beautiful

As I remember there is a State Farmers Market near Greensboro, Have you tried that one or the local farmer market? We have gotten many good plants at the State Farmer Market in Raleigh.

As far as getting the tree home. as said wrap it well and lay it down in the back of your truck. OR for about $20 you can rent a UHaul. How do you think a tree of any size is going to be delivered? If you have it installed it will be wrapped and delivered on an open truck or trailer like the Nuttal Maple they installed in our yard several years ago..

There are many roads from Greensboro. Make it a day trip. Grab your wife, pack a picnic, ,take the back roads, drive slower, and enjoy the spring color.

All I got to say is a $350 delivery charge when gas is $4 a gallon for a couple hours of driving don't add up.

Do you have a local Lowes, Home Depot, Tractor Supply. or even a Walmart.

I do have a Lowes, and I've had good luck with their plants! They don't have Southern Magnolias, though :-( They had several Japanese maples, a handful of fruit trees, and several juniper varieties, but that's it.

I can order it online, though, with free shipping... $96 for a 7G.

Tractor Supply here has NO plants! I didn't even know that others did! LOL

I avoid Walmart like the plague, but I'm tempted to check...

As for the others in Greensboro, it's really about time. An hour there and an hour back means that I have to allot at least half of the day, driving in a 90s model Ford that barely goes 45mph... :-O I'm self employed and my girlfriend has a fulltime job AND a side hustle, so I'm afraid that it's not an easy task to just take a day off to laze about :-(

All I got to say is a $350 delivery charge...

$350!! Brother, I'm looking at places with more like $15 shipping! LOL It looks like a lot of them have free shipping on orders over $100.

15 gal Alta & Little Gem Mags usually can be found under $200.00

Some of the SiteOne branches have plant material. Looks like the one in High Point does and also has Southern Magnolia. You could call and find out the price. https://www.siteone.com/en/search/?searchtype=product&text=magnolia

I saw a 15 gal, 4' tall, species Magnolia grandiflora at the Lowes today for $73.

What!! Which one, @Christopher CNC? They have 13G pots on Lowes.com for $129, but they're out of them:

https://www.lowes.com/pd/13-35-Gallon-White-Southern-Magnolia-Flowering-Tree-in-Pot-With-Soil-L1104/1000103655

I've really been thinking about buying 20 of the full size Southern Magnolias to build a hedge all around the perimeter of my property, and then in a few years (after they've started to fill in) I could remove most of the wild trees and start filling in with flowering trees or fruit trees. At $73 each, though, I'd save over $1100!

In January northern Virginia received a heavy snowfall which turned to ice. The mags were decimated - major branches were broken. Thus a mass planting of mags feels like a bad idea to me.

Ouch! Did they survive, or did it kill the trees?

I've been wanting to create an evergreen hedge wall of some sort to block out the close-by neighbor for awhile now. The neighbors are great, honestly, but they're in their 70s or 80s and I know that, at some point in the next 10 years, the house will have new tenants. So I'm trying to be proactive in case I'm suddenly surrounded by loud rednecks or something :-O

Oh it will come back. My magnolia lost over 2/3 of its height in an ice storm in 2000. I was going to take it down but a tree person told me it would come back. It certainly did. It doesn't have a central branch but the ones that came back all grew upward.

I used an allée of Magnolia grandifloras in order to create a privacy wall (NJ/Zone 7a/b). The ones in the picture are Edith Bogues, but further down there is Majestic Beauty and Victorias. I would say that in my area, heavy WET snows are more commonly experienced than ice storm event (those are rather rare). These varieties have been fine with the deepest and heaviest snows. They were about 2.5 feet tall when I planted them (some 15 years ago), now they are three stories tall. Over the years, there were some branches damaged that eventually regrew and filled in the canopy. The more vertically growing ones (ALTA) were horrible with snow issues, and they were cut down, or BLOWN down by wind. The wide-sprawling ones were fine with both wind and snow, again, I can't speak for ICE storm conditions, those are vicious on even deciduous trees! It's funny, I had never noticed it before, but for some reason my Majestic Beauty, and Victorias are all single-trunked, my Edith Bogues are both vigorously multiple trunking (almost reminding me of tropical banyan trees), and for the life of me, I have no idea why.