Cutting down one of my trees

That is horrible Esmay.

So sorry to read of this horrible bullying Esmay. Hope you have people to support you.

Thank you for your kind comments.
My friends rallied round me.
I was really glad to move in with my father and care for him .
I've reflected on not getting a restraining order against him .
I couldn't bear to face upsetting his wife and daughters .
But I do think that he's mentally ill .
I saw him about a month ago and managed to get him to leave me alone by being cool and dismissive.
A simular thing happened to a friend in Wimbledon .
Her neighbour constantly spied on her and made complaints as mine did and also made overtures .
She moved house and unfortunately couldn't afford to move back after her neighbour left .
It happens !

What an unpleasant person your neighbour appears to be. I'm afraid I'm a real tree freak ie I love trees and I'm afraid I cried when we had to have part of a very old tree cut back BUT it has perked up again thankfully thanks to the careful men who cut it back properly.
What was here first: the trees or the houses? I feel that many people forget the importance of trees.
I was lucky enough to be brought up in an area where trees were accepted but now in my dotage and a long way away I come across many people cutting down trees forgetting their importance. Very sad

He is a vile bully and hated my friendship with his wife and daughters.
I also love trees and treasure my privacy.

The privacy thing is very real esmay - my daughter's neighbour has chopped down an enormous tree and made her house very exposed now.

She said she'd rather have the tree and less light.

Definitely fell it. We have so little sun as it is, shading someone else's home is a big NO

was the tree there when she moved in?, i would trim it back but not take it away when she has plenty of sunshine in other parts of her garden, some people just need to complain about something.

@Furret surely all you need is to take the crown down a bit?

Coal tits live on conifer trees. My neighbour cut down their 50’ conifer and the coal tits have all disappeared (died.)
Ask your councils wild life officer about the birds and can you cut it down Furret?

Can you put up nesting boxes well within your own garden, and then either fell the tree, or trim it even more drastically, and perhaps plant something that grows quickly as far away from this "sun is more important than wild-life" neighbour?

You won't change her views, unfortunately.

Further to my previous post, I just add on a couple of other ideas that come to mind.
1. You might take pictures as it is now, for both future reference, and also it might be worth your talking to a local gardening club, who might have good information as to the best tree people around and also ideas of what might be grown in shade.
2. If you dont think it would stir up a hornets nest, you could speak to your council and check out the situation as far as they are concerned. I know there have been changes about very high hedges but it doesnt seem to apply in your case. However it might be useful to check how the local bylaws might affect it now or in the future. Then knowing you are not doing anything against the law, you can relax and enjoy your garden.
3. If your neighbour doesnt like it ,then you can either just ignore her where possible, or tell her what the council etc have said and offer her ideas for plants for the shade. Then go back to enjoying your own garden and let her get someone else to look after her hens. Oh by the way if she has a cockerel you can also mention that that is quite disturbing for you too, so that problems are not one way only, but that you try to live in harmony as you obviously have done until she came along. (Oh it might be quite useful for a little while to have ear phones in when in the garden. She doesnt need to know whether you actually have any music on or not!! )

sarahcyn

@Furret surely all you need is to take the crown down a bit?

Furret said earlier that she did this last year.

SparklyGrandma

Coal tits live on conifer trees. My neighbour cut down their 50’ conifer and the coal tits have all disappeared (died.)
Ask your councils wild life officer about the birds and can you cut it down Furret?

"Coal tits typically nest in tree hollows or small holes in trees, walls, or banks, and may also nest in the ground"

Neighbours and trees! The person whose house we bought, and who planted all the trees/hedging in the garden, moved next door. She often complained that the trees were shading her new garden but when we offered to fell/cut them back said NO! Unfortunately she has recently passed away, should we sort the trees/hedging now before the property is sold or wait and see what the new neighbours are like? (We did get on well with our old neighbour apart from the tree/hedge issue!).

Suburban gardens can be pretty large - I'm a suburban semi with a 100m back garden & 50m front garden , pretty wide too - OK it would only be a tiny field, but a Leylandi or conifer would be a drop in the ocean in mine.
We did have the leylandi hedge at the bottom taken out when we moved here, mainly cos we don't particularly like them.

I think the birds will come back - as long as no cats start to frequent your garden.

I photographed my garden before and after. One issue, as well as the bliddy leylandi, was the Ivy destroying my new fence. I pointed out in a non confrontational way (I hope) that they were legally responsible for the expensive damage. The Ivy was gone in a week. They agreed my Gardner could reduce the leylandi to a level we both agreed at my expense . Phew

I thought legislation was passed a few years ago that restricted the height of conifers in gardens to something like 2 mtrs. Think it came to the fore due to issues with hedges blocking light.

We were lucky to have 3 Eucalyptus trees cut down , free of charge by the electricity board as they were near to overhead lines which would be damaged if the trees were to be blown over in storm. Plenty of logs and chopped barks for mulch
DD had a substantial garden shed badly damaged by a row of conifers in a neighbour's garden which were blown over in a winter storm.
Due to different root formation some trees are more prone to being blown over. RHS is a useful source if such information

Our house was built in 1800s there are some very old trees in the garden that require fairly regular attention including some gorgeous huge horse chestnuts. Our last bill from the tree surgeon was over £2k.
We can't do the work ourselves because some of the trees require someone working from a harness or cherry picker.
I love our mature trees but they're not on anyone's boundary! When the house was built the driveway was used by coach and horses not the horse lorry that I drove down to stables. Times change. We've had to remove the odd tree but we've planted more than we've removed!

I had a beautiful silver birch, tall but slender, which only cast a shadow on our own garden but my new neighbours continually moaned about it because apparently it interfered with their Sky tv reception.Eventually they offered to pay to have it removed and for a quiet life,I agreed-they admitted it didn't improve their Tv though. Recently they asked to trim some branches growing near, but not over, the border fence on our smallish Rowan tree ,and pop round to clear any mess. We were out and on returning found they had cut it right down, just a stump left. I'm so angry, it was lovely when laden with berries and now its butchered. They also removed a winter flowering jasmine growing beside the fence.

How very rude

We had someone (behind) chop off a massive branch of next-door's ancient sycamore and chuck it over into ^our garden.
Presumably they thought the tree was ours.
Or they just don't care.

It squashed the seedlings in our raised bed.

This has happened twice now.

Hellos no help to you now but I believe they broke the law
Criminal damage?

4allweknow

I thought legislation was passed a few years ago that restricted the height of conifers in gardens to something like 2 mtrs. Think it came to the fore due to issues with hedges blocking light.

Only applies to hedges