What to Plant in Brisbane & SEQ - Month by Month

January is hot, wet and humid, which suits tropical growers perfectly. Palms, clumping bamboo and tropical screens establish fast with the storms doing your watering. Hold off on anything silver-leafed or Mediterranean, they hate wet feet in the heat. Mulch everything thickly and plant in the cool of the evening. Browse the tropical garden look if you want the full resort effect while the growing is easy.

February is the peak of the wet. It's a fine month for palms, lilly pillies and rainforest natives, and a poor one for lavender and westringia, which would rather drown than grow right now. If a cyclone-season downpour flattens part of the garden, treat it as a renovation invitation. Screening gaps can be fixed fast with Lilly Pilly Resilience, which shrugs off humidity and psyllids alike.

March is arguably SEQ's premium planting month. The soil is warm and deeply wet, the worst heat has passed, and anything planted now establishes before winter. Hedges, feature trees, natives, tropicals: everything goes. If you plant one hedge a year, plant it in March. Price it in the calculator, and consider jumping to 45L advanced stock, autumn establishment forgives the bigger root ball.

April keeps everything March promised, with milder days. It's the classic month for hedging at any size, for murraya that will perfume next summer, and for citrus and fruit trees, which settle in beautifully before the dry. Lawns repair well now too. If you're planning a whole garden rather than one bed, the garden pricer prices the entire plan in one hit.

May is the last of the properly warm soil. Evergreen screens planted now, sweet viburnum especially, knit together through winter and explode in spring. It's also prime time for camellias and gardenias while the air is cool. Water in well: the dry season is starting, and establishment watering matters more from here until storm season returns.

An SEQ winter is a southern spring, and June is genuinely good planting weather: mild days, cool nights, no frost near the coast. Evergreen hedges, natives and citrus all go in happily. This is also when you can see the bones of the garden clearly, so it's the natural month to plan bigger moves through the garden ideas pages and get plants ordered before the spring rush.

July is hedge month in Brisbane. The soil never gets cold enough here to stall roots, transplant shock is minimal, and anything planted now is established by the time spring heat arrives. Resilience, photinia and viburnum all plant beautifully. Deciduous trees and roses go in bare-root now too. Run your fence line through the hedge calculator and get it done before August winds.

August is dry and breezy, so water new plantings well, but it remains an excellent month for screens and structure. The real advantage is commercial: plant now and you're weeks ahead of the September crowds, with roots moving before the soil properly warms. Feature trees at 100L size planted in August look like they've been there a year by Christmas.

September in SEQ is the green light for everything: hedges, tropicals, natives, flowering shrubs, herbs, lawns. Growth is instant and visible weekly. It's the single best month to buy an instant garden pack, because every plant in it hits the ground running. The only caution is water: spring rain is unreliable, so soak new plantings twice a week until the storms arrive.

October grows anything but punishes neglect. Plant early in the month if you can, mulch hard, and water deeply rather than daily. Tropicals, palms and bamboo screens love the building heat. Gardenias and murraya planted now will flower for Christmas. If your project involves large trees, order now: freight and installers book out towards summer.

November's heat and early storms suit the true tropicals: palms, frangipani-style feature planting, lush understorey. Evergreen hedging still works with committed watering, but if you can wait, the March window rewards patience. This is a fine month for the poolside look, everything in that palette is a heat lover.

December splits in two: the fortnight before Christmas is fine for tough tropicals and emergency screening, the fortnight after belongs to the beach. If guests are coming and a fence line embarrasses you, advanced screening stock with tailgate delivery can fix a sight line in a day. Otherwise, water what you have, enjoy the flush, and let the calendar roll to the real planting months.