A wonderful plant for an architectural or a structural effect in the garden is the humble pencil pine, or Italian Cypress (Cupressus sempervirens var. Sricta). It is an evergreen tree to around 20 metres (60′) tall, with an upright, columnar form and dense dark green foliage. It will grow in most areas of Australia, except for the tropics.
Don discovered a row of five pencil pines by the side of a road, and even though they were old and neglected they were all uniform in shape. The reason they looked so good is that they were cloned or grown from cuttings, not from seed. Plants grown from seed can vary tremendously, and in the case of pencil pines some will be broad, some narrow and others may have floppy branches. Even though most modern nurseries are excellent, unfortunately some nurserymen are propagating these plants from seed. If you want a matching row of pencil pines, it’s very important to ask at the nursery how they’ve been grown, and only buy those pencil pines grown from cuttings.