Hedge/tree problem with neighbour

Ahh thanks for the advice.
Yes pergola does sound like a good idea, I like the wooden ones, husband likes the more modern metal ones where you can alter the roof slats.
Maybe laurel isn’t such a good idea.
May put in some various evergreens, keep them low so that they dont grow to a ridiculous height.
We get on great with the neighbors & would hate to fall out over a hedge.
Looking back another neighbour to the left, had huge conifers, which blocked our light, grass was boggy because the sun couldn’t dry the grass. They did take them out..I did like them as it acted like a noise barrier, but once out, best thing ever as now our grass is perfectly dry.

Just thinking now - as I "think" everyone in Britain knows:
- back gardens are supposed to be private
- front gardens are not private (unless you've got loadsa money and can buy a HUGE house with huge garden etc etc)

and I get it both ways in my house with succeeding neighbours that came here after I moved in I guess.

The house adjacent to my front garden keeps trying to use their front garden as a "back garden" and I can feel the resentment wafting up that they havent got front garden privacy - and I'm there thinking "It's a front garden - front gardens don't have privacy". So I try and tune it out and think "Why aren't they using their back garden as a 'back garden' rather than wafting resentment up at me that I can clearly see their front garden?". That's an odd one - given that the neighbour there and the one before them bought their house years after I got mine and basically set my garden up. So they could see how that houses front garden is before buying it - ie no privacy at all.

Though the last one tried to deal with that by stealing enough of my front garden that they could put up a fence on my land to block me out. Thankfully they didnt manage it - the Land Registry arent that daft - and they just succeeded in stealing a bit of my garden that gives them no advantage whatsoever...and in fact carries a big disadvantage to them.

Japonica /Quince makes a very successful hedge .
I have one in my front garden . It has beautiful white blossoms and is easily pruned .
I have a rich orange and a soft pink one in the back garden.
I'm careful of the sharp thorns it produces .

Caleo

Cariad Again, Is it palisading, or espalier? I know what you mean by" trees on stilts". where the branches are trained horizontally. I saw photos of a bungalow that had those, on Rightmove. I liked the effect very much.

If I had to move house that needed privacy in the back garden I'd use trellis, as my life expectancy does not favour wait for a tree of any sort to grow tall enough for privacy.

Espalier = the word I'm looking for.

I get what you mean about protecting your own privacy. One of the reasons I bought my current house is that there's a large back garden behind my back wall and mature trees in it gave me quite a bit of back garden privacy. Unfortunately one of them keeled over dead in the heavy winds we sometimes get here and the owner has kept chopping at and chopping at another one - to feed a logburner fire they got after I moved in I think - grrr!

By the time I was told they tried to gardengrab that garden back along - and had safely been defeated on that by the then owner of my house and the next door neighbour = that got me worried. Add that there are tall houses the other side of their garden and they've nearly all darn well put rooms in their roof and there's now a row of those "slanted into the roof" windows - grrrrrr!!!! They are big enough houses anyway - but they couldnt resist the temptation to add a "room in the roof and blow the neighbours".

A bit worrying all round - so I had 15-20 years estimated life expectancy at that point and have planted a few (fruit) trees in my back garden and got HUGE pots and put a few more trees into them and positioned them alongside the wall.

I think they've got the hint not to hack down some tall trees into a hedge finally along some of that boundary and are just leaving them tall now - you can't exactly miss a neighbour watching with obvious dismay when hedge-cutting is going on and it's obviously seen from their garden that I'm trying to get my back garden privacy back.

Yep....one does think about estimated remaining life expectancy before doing anything major I know. I had my house gutted over a couple of years when I moved here at 60 - because I'm from an area where we do keep our houses pretty modern/do necessary work on them by and large and I have noticed many houses here with similar age people in don't seem to have been touched since the 1970s/1980s. But now I've hit my 70's and have done everything I can to turn my West Wales house into a South-West England house iyswim then I bear in mind how long I estimate I've got left and that I do not want a "longer than average life" - so I base my calculations on an estimated 10 years to go.

Mt61, Have you considered a long pergola? They are cost effective for screening against a neighbouring higher -up property that really looks down over one's garden . You probably want screening from above rather than at the sides, although it's easy to also add screening to the side of a pergola. With a pergola you get a nice frame for quick growing climbers such as star jasmine.Or if you want evergreen there is canary ivy.

Cariad Again, Is it palisading, or espalier? I know what you mean by" trees on stilts". where the branches are trained horizontally. I saw photos of a bungalow that had those, on Rightmove. I liked the effect very much.

If I had to move house that needed privacy in the back garden I'd use trellis, as my life expectancy does not favour wait for a tree of any sort to grow tall enough for privacy.

Leylandii are not particularly good for wildlife but merely take up space and light ,and are hard to keep to the legal size when they constitute a hedge.

Wildlife friendly gardens have to be tended for maximun benefit including benefit to the humans who enjoy the garden.

Just seen another poster has described this - as a "hedge on stilts". We're obviously picturing the same thing.

Mt61

I would like to put in a laurel hedge where it backs on to our neighbors, their house is higher up & they can see into our garden . just wondering if that is the best thing now. Don’t want any arguments with our neighbours. Any ideas on what is fairly slow growing? Thanks

There must be a name for it - but I'm thinking of the way some people resolve a "lack of privacy" problem in their gardens is to have a row of trees (ordinary type ones - not leylandii or the like) that just have trunks growing up to around fence height and then the branches are trained to go along sideways between each other. I can picture it and there is a house in my area where they've done that.

I'm surprised there aren't more "tree hedges" like that - considering how it seems to be the norm for newbuild houses of recent years to have loads of windows looking down into their back gardens - totally ignoring the British convention that "Back gardens are private".

“ People with so called overgrown gardens for wildlife tend to be lazy and to be using that as a very lame excuse for the state of their jungle. Selfish people”

Exactly I agree with Karmalady We are in dispute with our neighbour who backs on to our garden. He has an extremely high Leylandi tree that blocks light to our garden and sheds its debris into ours causing us numerous other problems as well. After many years of trying to negotiate we have enlisted the help of the local Council. They agreed we had a valid case and we had to pay them £450 to do a detailed survey and they have subsequently issued a Remedial order to our neighbour to keep his tree and adjoining hedge to under 4.5 metres for the life of the tree. He has ignored this and the District council have proceeded to take him to court to enforce this order. Case due to be heard in two weeks. Our neighbours garden is an utter mess. I dread to think what is lurking in his garden but the Council have taken on the fight so let’s hope for resolution now 🤞 but I’m not holding my breath!!

I think that it's sometimes completely impossible to negotiate with some people .
My reclusive neighbour's other neighbours had to replace their greenhouse as his brambles grew through it .
Prior to having it replaced they cut down and cleared the offending brambles with his permission.
I offered him some almost new and very expensive garden furniture which had been given to me and some garden plants .
He thanked me and then said that he had no intention of going into his garden .
I've asked another tree surgeon to give me a quote ,but I wonder if I'm going to have the same problem as before - he will be denied access and won't be able to cut the hedge down properly.
The last one went off in a huff -
I'm describing his exit politely he stormed off with a tirade of expletives!

Lahlah65

You could think about something like silver birches - not the native ones but cultivated varieties with very white bark, that don’t grow so tall. They would give a screening effect, especially in the summer, and could under planted with shrubs.
A friend planted three hornbeams, that have been pruned to make a sort of high hedge on stilts (if that makes any sense!) Very attractive in its own right, but a really effective screen too.
Both of these trees grow surprisingly quickly, especially if you can afford to start with slightly larger ones.

Sorry, this was meant as a suggestion for Mt61!

You could think about something like silver birches - not the native ones but cultivated varieties with very white bark, that don’t grow so tall. They would give a screening effect, especially in the summer, and could under planted with shrubs.
A friend planted three hornbeams, that have been pruned to make a sort of high hedge on stilts (if that makes any sense!) Very attractive in its own right, but a really effective screen too.
Both of these trees grow surprisingly quickly, especially if you can afford to start with slightly larger ones.

I can’t help wondering if you have ever actually lived next to a properly overgrown garden?

One problem - Rats.

Earthmother9

Some people and I am one of them love overgrown gardens and if there was wildlife in there I would never want to touch it. But I can see from her side of things that not everyone feels that way. It's his garden he can do with it as he pleases.

I can’t help wondering if you have ever actually lived next to a properly overgrown garden? My daughter lives in a narrow terraced house and has permanent problems with the HMO next door. The landlord is happy to take the rent but does nothing to maintain the garden. Earlier this year, the huge brambles had grown over the 6ft fence and were reaching halfway across my daughter‘s garden. It looked like a railway bank. She couldn’t even cut her own grass. There is absolutely no shortage of wildlife on her side of the fence, where foxes and badges are regular visitors, not to mention loads of birds and insects. She does pretty minimal garden maintenance, but she does mow the grass periodically, and keep shrubs like buddleia under control.
I understand that some people really don’t like gardening, but how hard is it to just go out there with a strimmer and a hedge cutter a couple of times a year, just to keep things under control? Or pay someone else to do it for you? There are plenty of contractors who do this kind of ‘ground clearance’.
You have a legal and moral responsibility to do at least the minimum necessary to ensure that your neighbours can enjoy their own property, and that no damage is being caused.

Mt61

I would like to put in a laurel hedge where it backs on to our neighbors, their house is higher up & they can see into our garden . just wondering if that is the best thing now. Don’t want any arguments with our neighbours. Any ideas on what is fairly slow growing? Thanks

Laurel adversely affects the quality of the soil.

Alternate photinia and choisya look quite good but I don't know what height you want them to grow to eventually?

Beware of cutting down any established hedges.
When I returned from my long holiday in Canada, I discovered that my neighbour had removed the beautiful hedge between our houses and installed an ugly breeze-block wall.
I took legal advice. I was advised to sue him. Ofcourse, my Solicitor was excellent. . After months of court dates and hearings, we won and my neighbour was ordered to pay me £5000 compensation and replace the breeze-block with a red brick wall.
That was 20+ years ago.
After that, I couldn’t bear the thought of living next door to him. I also wanted a fresh start after my divorce. I sold up and moved to my present house.
Alls well that ends well….

Caleo

Monica, The suburban environment really matters .

Yes, but fir trees are not as good as many other species of plant and pollinators may prefer a wider range of flowering plants and shrubs which could be difficult to grow where there is shade from conifers.

Overgrown and messy is not necessarily good - managed gardens with plenty of attractions fot wildlife are better. It takes a lot of work to maintain a "wild garden".

The bay tree will survive even if it has a good prune and the fir trees could be replaced by something better to attract bees, butterflies and insects.

There are leylandii hedges on either side of our garden - planted by the respective neighbours just inside their boundary lines. But neither side have properly maintained them, and they have grown taller over the years. Our garden slopes quite steeply, and about 10 years ago when DH fell off the ladder again trying to cut them, I insisted that we got professional contractors in. They bring ladders and all the kit they need, and take all of the rubbish away with them. We get them in February. The cost has gradually gone up, but it is still less than £300. Because it’s done regularly, we’ve managed to control the height, and the width on our side at least. I know that one of them looks awful mess from the other side, but I don’t have to look at it!
It does make me cross to have to pay to have hedges cut, when neither of them are ours. But I think the alternative would have been even worse.

Perhaps it needs a more drastic cut back/down, next time SiL comes if he is willing. The longer you leave it the worse it will get.
I have never heard of councils charging for you to complain about your neighbours - yes if you wish to go to formal dispute, but they will have expected to to have asked, complained to him in writing at least twice before they will even accept a high hedges dispute.

How do your other neighbours feel about it? Perhaps they can weigh in? The bay tree is a general nuisance and should never have been planted in the first place, and may affect your foundations, so threaten to sue him if he does nothing

I would like to put in a laurel hedge where it backs on to our neighbors, their house is higher up & they can see into our garden . just wondering if that is the best thing now. Don’t want any arguments with our neighbours. Any ideas on what is fairly slow growing? Thanks

We had a problem with very tall conifers neighbours planted years ago along the fence line. In the end we paid to have them topped out. It was very expensive, approaching a thousand pounds. Apparently it costs more to top them out because it takes longer and would have been cheaper to fell them completely, but neighbour wouldnt agree to that. They did allow access, probably because we met the bill, but they wouldnt pay towards the cost. I was told they would look after the tree surgeons and give them cups of tea! It is massively better for us letting the light into our downstairs rooms so I guess it was worth it.

op, do look up copper nails and buy some

I saw a passiflora behind my fence and then I saw a passiflora root metres away in my new build garden. I had just moved in and bought bamboo root barrier, made from felt and impregnated with copper. I had to dig a deep trench for it and leave a couple of inches above soil. Every year I keep up with the copper and put a bit of copper sulphate into a watering can and simply put that solution between the barrier and the wall, no foundation. Similar to what water companies do to stop roots interfering with drains

Try and think outside the box op. Personally having neighbours with established gardens was a must. No trees by me and only bramble at the top now and then. I do have apple trees but all are plenty far enough away from the wall, so as to never annoy the neighbours. I turned two houses down that had trees I would have had no control over

People with so called overgrown gardens for wildlife tend to be lazy and to be using that as a very lame excuse for the state of their jungle. Selfish people

Get a free surgeon in to have a look and give you a quote.

Then politely tell neighbour what it is and will he pay.
If unwilling then maybe offer to go halves or something.

If you are that unwell physically, then it’s madness to keep doing what you are already doing.
Sorry, meant to say Tree surgeon.