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Leaves - not mine!

(54 Posts)
Marmight Thu 31-Oct-19 12:06:08

I have had a few problems with my neighbour since moving here 2 years ago. Basically he’s a bit of an old woman's blouse, ocd and a bully. Its a long story which I will spare you, however I have coped, trying to keep on the right side of him (apart from when I told him I was fed up with his bullying tactics ?) and even agreeing to have our mutual parking area resurfaced, although I really didn't want or need the extra expense. It is now like Brighton beach. There is a red leaved plum tree in his garden. About 90% of the leaves fall on my property and are difficult to rake up over the ‘beach’. He however has a leaf blower and I notice today that his side, again, is clear of leaves having been suitably blown, many in my direction I suspect. I did suggest last week that it would be neighbourly if he blew those on my property as well?. He hasn’t taken the bait obviously! Would it be completely childish of me to deposit these leaves back onto his path? Or should I just be more principled and suck it up? Comments please (tongue in cheek emoji)

Silverlady333 Fri 01-Nov-19 11:06:47

Actually you can buy leaf blowers / suckers with wheels on the bottom of the tube. I have one. It can get a bit heavy if I suck the leaves up but as others have said it chops up the leaves and makes a lovely mulch or can be composted.

Barmeyoldbat Fri 01-Nov-19 11:09:15

I would just wait, bide your time. There will come a time when HE will want something from you. That is the time to get your own back.

Greciangirl Fri 01-Nov-19 11:23:39

Ask him if you can borrow his leaf blower.
You never know, he might offer to help.

Or buy your own. They really are very useful.

FC61 Fri 01-Nov-19 11:47:34

Are you not , by law, allowed to trim the part of the tree that hangs over your garden?

jura2 Fri 01-Nov-19 11:58:22

Perhaps it depends on the 'history' too.

We used to live next to a paddock, with a large mixed hedge of trees on our boundary. Our house was built in 1920s. Then the neighbour sold the paddock, and the builders put a bungalow just a couple of metres from our boundary, with a wooden fence as close as poss. to our mixed hedge. It was put on sale much cheaper than the other new bungalows because of this ...

And then the complaints came thick and fast- our leaves, our snails, our slugs, our birds even, us stealing their light.

Tillybelle Fri 01-Nov-19 12:30:09

Marmight
So sorry to hear this and my deepest sympathy nay empathy as I have similar experiences.
Please forgive brevity - I have a few problems - well pain actually.
Last night coincidentally when I looked up height of leylandii - I learned that you need your local council to help you with dispute with a neighbour. you can give his leaves back but i expect he'll just blow them back again.
I really feel for you on this. He clearly is a nasty bully. Don't give in to him on anything unreasonable and record/film all conversations etc.
You may be stuck with the leaves but asking advice of council might help. Making mulch with them is a good idea! He would hate to think you were gaining something from his mean actions!
Good luck!

Tillybelle Fri 01-Nov-19 12:31:40

jura2
Oh jura! I'm so sorry! Surely the history was on your side?

Tillybelle Fri 01-Nov-19 12:33:01

FC61 Yes and any roots! You can give them back as they belong to the neighbour.

jannxxx Fri 01-Nov-19 12:47:48

i have one neighbour who takes the mick, 6 parking bays meant for our 6 houses yet private home owner next door uses three of them despite having huge drive and garage, sadly noone else wants to say anything so i have to put up with it, after 20 years in same house im looking to move next year, suppose the moral is how much you can tolerate,

Chucky Fri 01-Nov-19 13:28:35

@Nicolaed “He mows the verge grass up to our house line and parks his car to that line too.”

If it is the drivers side he parks at the house line, I would suggest that you also park next to that line, passenger door obviously! Or, if you don’t want to do that, place some heavy plant pots just your side of the line! He would have no grounds for complaint and would soon park further away. ?

grandtanteJE65 Fri 01-Nov-19 14:10:07

I just leave the leaves (sorry about the pun). They do no harm after all.

It's not worth offending your neighbour by being so childish as to put them back in his garden. If you are strong enough to sweep them up, do as already suggested and make leaf mould of them.

jura2 Fri 01-Nov-19 14:16:30

Thanks tilly - as it happened, we sold and moved ;)

Looks like the hedge has been taken down for the Nursery to make a vegetable patch. Surprised they got planning permission, as the old mixed hedge was protected. And the couple long died.

HiPpyChick57 Fri 01-Nov-19 14:21:41

That’s a great suggestion that Kathy made about pretending to sell them.
I had problems with my neighbour a few years ago. My rear garden has trees and the leaves fall into her garden. She complained to me but I said there’s not a lot I could do. Well she suggested I came around to sweep them seeing as how they were my trees. I pointed out that since I work and being a single parent I really wouldn’t have the time to do that.
Then for a little while after she swept them up herself and threw them over the fence onto mine. Well I really didn’t mind, my gardens ok but not a showpiece so I didn’t care really.
Well then she suddenly decided to dump them inside my front gate. She actually walked up her steps, up the back alley, down a bunch of steps and along the front of our houses and leaned over to tip them onto the bottom of my steps.
I suppose she thought if she had to make an effort to sweep up the leaves then I wasn’t going to get away with doing nothing!!!
Except that is what I did... nothing! I simply left them there. It made me giggle when every time she passed in the car she craned her neck to see if I’d swept them up lol.
She got tired after a while or maybe she realised she was putting far more effort into my leaves than I was ever going to.
I did eventually sweep them up as I do every year after all of them have fallen off the trees. You only do it once then.
I hope you come to some agreement with your old codger soon.

madmum38 Fri 01-Nov-19 14:26:54

We had something similar and afraid it isn’t just old men. Our gardens are open planned and have the grass cutters come regularly and cut all the gardens at the same time,pay extra for the service. Each block of two houses have joint front gardens,our neighbours never wait for the garden service and does their half themselves although they will still have to pay the service charge,it looks so stupid though as both sides of the garden having different height grass

Maremia Fri 01-Nov-19 14:45:11

I'm with Kathy1959.

Want2Help Fri 01-Nov-19 15:46:29

I sympathise!
Where we used to live there were a lot of trees and one lovely autumn day I swept and gathered them up from our front drive and borders with our leaf sucker upper smile and then went out. On returning our neighbour had decided to use her 'LSU' too BUT must have used the blow facility. Needless to say our drive and garden were covered! I decided not to make an issue about it but it took a while to calm down. They were always doing strange things, but always seemed to wait until we were out to do them grin... as someone just said there are some very sad people out there!

Debs551964 Fri 01-Nov-19 17:06:29

Lemongrass what a brilliant idea! I shall do that myself as our grass needs it's final cut weather permitted over the weekend ?. Mind you it's no good for my front garden as I have no grass, I have gravel hehehe

Debs551964 Fri 01-Nov-19 17:21:52

Camelotclub..... Yep I fee for you my DH is a miserable old git and as he's aged he's got much worse! Arghhh b****y Men eh!! ????

Applegran Fri 01-Nov-19 17:54:12

I agree with Esther1. Life's too short to fall out over this.

HiPpyChick57 Fri 01-Nov-19 18:20:08

Thinking of it now I’m sure I’ve read somewhere that if you trim branches from off trees and bushes overhanging into your garden that it’s regarded as fly tipping.

Merryweather Fri 01-Nov-19 20:39:17

I'll swap you for my druggie next door neighbors and the fumes every few minutes. Absolutely stinks! Then there's the delightful language.
Any takers????

Grandmablue Fri 01-Nov-19 21:15:37

Not really Callistemon. Clear incompetence and negligence by consultants who are protected and represented by BAPIO that when investigated claim racism to cloud and cover their negligence.... everyone MUST have a choice ....

Marmight Fri 01-Nov-19 23:25:12

confused.Wrong thread I think Grandmablue!!

Interesting to read all your comments to my ‘tongue-in-cheek’ thread. I don’t think my mower even on its highest level would cope with Brighton beach. I’ve raked up quite a pile today and am hoping the rest will be scattered in the high winds which are forecast for tomorrow. Peculiarly, since posting, I have learnt that Mr Nextdoor wants to fell the tree, not on my account, but because from his perspective there is a gap in the branches which offends him! I obviously see the tree’s better side. So it appears that next year my leaf problem will be solved. Despite that I am sad that this beautiful tree will receive the chop

Fabulous50s Sat 02-Nov-19 08:24:12

Another joyless candidate to add to my list of old boys ripe for culling!
To be fair though, it’s not only elderly men who become obsessive about this sort of thing. A friend was forced to butcher her mimosa tree earlier this year as the young female tenant next door couldn’t stand the “mess” made by the fallen flowers ?

LinkyPinky Sat 02-Nov-19 14:13:33

It is much better for the environment to leave leaves on the ground.