Verge gardens · photographed 21 September

The strip between the footpath and the road

Most verges round here are dead grass and bindii. A few neighbours have turned theirs into small native gardens, and the birds and insects find them fast. Here are the ones nearby, planted and not yet.

Brighton Boulevard, North Bondi

Two timber-edged beds on the same stretch of verge. One has been planted with Australian natives; the other is the same bed a season or two earlier, still waiting.

A rectangular timber-edged verge bed on a grass strip beside the footpath, planted with young native grasses and a red-flowering kangaroo paw, mulched with wood chips — Planted. Native grasses, groundcovers and a kangaroo paw in flower, mulched, under a street tree.

The same style of timber-edged verge bed, this one full of dry weeds and long grass — Not yet. Same bed shape, a few doors down, waiting for someone to adopt it.

Close view of the planted verge bed: clumps of fine native grass, a kangaroo paw with red stems and a small groundcover, in wood-chip mulch — Closer. Small plants, spaced out, in a thick layer of mulch. It looks sparse for the first year and then fills in.

Why bother

A verge garden is the cheapest habitat you can make. Native grasses and groundcovers feed insects, insects feed the small birds, and a line of planted verges is a corridor between the park and the next patch of green. They also need far less water than lawn once they're in, and nobody has to mow them.

The plants that suit this coast are the ones that already grow on the headlands: coastal rosemary, lomandra and dianella, native grasses, pigface and other groundcovers, and the small banksias and grevilleas that the honeyeaters work over. Council's guidelines have a species list.

Starting one

The verge belongs to council, so you apply first. Waverley Council approves verge gardens and encourages locally native plants. From their page, checked 22 September 2026:

Read the Verge Garden Guidelines and fill in the application form.
Sketch the layout. Plants stay under two metres, sightlines and the footpath stay clear, no weeds.
If the garden runs onto a neighbour's verge, or you rent or are in a strata block, get their written OK.
Email the form, a photo and the sketch to publicgardening@waverley.nsw.gov.au. Council says applications are usually assessed within 21 business days.

Free native plants are available to residents through council's Living Connections program. Questions: 9083 8916.

Details from council's verge gardens page. If they change, council's page is right and this one is out of date; tell us.

Know of another one?

If there's a planted verge near the park that should be here, or you've just put one in, send a photo and the street and we'll add it.