Ask Alys: your gardening questions answered

Can you suggest a hard-wearing hedge, preferably evergreen (maybe yew?), with edible berries as a barrier between my home and a busy road?
You cannot have your cake and eat it. Well, you can, but you have to promise to spit out the seeds: the flesh around yew berries (Taxus baccata) is edible; the seed is poisonous. And I wouldn't eat edibles planted on a busy road, because pollution is likely to be high. Sorry to dash your hopes.

But a mixed native hedge is a lovely idea: space each species at least 30cm apart and go for some repetition between evergreen and deciduous, or it will look messy. An alternative is Viburnum tinus 'Eve Price', which has dense, green foliage. From late winter to spring, pink budded flowers open to tiny, sweet-smelling, star-shaped, white flowers, followed by black berries (not edible to us, but birds will be pleased). V. tinus is hardy, and tolerant of sun or partial shade and strong wind. It will grow to around 2m. Or try Himalayan cotoneaster, Cotoneaster simonsii, a semi-evergreen shrub with small, glossy leaves, white flowers and (non-edible) scarlet berries.