We live in a detached house at the end of a cul de sac, we generally got along well with our next door neighbours until a few years ago when she became obsessed with the fence between our gardens. There is a 8 foot wall around the other side of our garden and the back, with a 6 foot wooden fence between us and them. The fence isn't new, it was there when we moved in over 20 years ago. It's not leaning or falling down anything. There were about two or three small chunks out of the top of it due to her gardener's and my DH's enthusiastic pruning.
Before they moved in (12 years ago) we had climbers all along the fence and the previous neighbour had the same. It was glorious! The climbers on their side gradually disappeared and some of ours died off, so we knew they weren't fans. About 4 years she knocked and told us we had to dig up the ivy that was growing on our fence because it was killing her plants. The ivy was only growing on a small part of the fence where there is no light between the two houses. We told her to cut it back on her side if it was bothering her. A few days later her gardener knocked to say the ivy was damaging the soil quality and again DH said they could cut it back if it was bothering them. A few days later she knocked again and said we had to dig up the ivy as it was damaging the fence. DH told her it was our fence and if it was damaged we would deal with it. She seemed surprised but appeared to take it on board.
Because they were so persistent, DH dug up the ivy two weeks after this conversation and that was that - or so we thought.
About 13 months ago she had her garden 'landscaped.' Cowboys does not adequately describe the people she got in and as I was wfh I was alert to make sure they were no issues with the fence.
One night she knocked and complained that our 'poisin ivy' had killed her trees. She showed me a picture of some sad looking plants which had been planted between her house and our fence and pointed some dead twigs coming out of the fence. I told her the twigs were the from ivy plant that DH dug up when she complained and that her trees had died as they never got any light. She then told me that she was taking the fence down putting a new one up and none of our plants were allowed to touch it. I told her in no uncertain terms that it was our fence and she was not to touch it. She then told me that the people living on the other side of her had told her it was her fence. (Presumably because her fence is covered with plants and climbers coming from their garden.) She pointed to our wall and said "that's yours." After I had explained that in a row of houses one end would always have two fences, I showed her the deeds which clearly show the fence is ours. I even let her have a photo of the relevant document so she could show her husband. She said she would build a new fence on her property.
A few days later I looked out of the window to see two men attaching some twig screening to our fence. I went out and told them to stop as it was our property. They refused and laughed when I threatened to call the police. I knocked next door and despite having 4 cars on the drive nobody answered. I left a voicemail telling her they had to stop.
Twenty minutes later she came to the door and literally screamed at us for 20 minutes. It was awful. she said she had paid them £400 to put these twigs up as our dreadful fence was ruining her garden. Finally we agreed they could finish putting the screening up but nothing else was to be attached to our fence. A few days later I found someone doing something to the screening which had caused a chunk of the crossbeam to fall off. Again he refused to stop when I asked him, but this time I was so upset that my dog came out barking and growling. Faced with 10 stone of unhappy dog he stopped, but came back and did it a few days later while we were out.
Now (finally) to my AIBU. Storm Eunice has ripped most the screening off the fence taking a plank with it. It has definitely damaged it in a few places. I want to avoid another row, but | am not replacing the fence at the moment and I am NOT being told what I can and can't grow by the fence, so I am thinking it might be best to send her a text saying that we notice the screening has blown down and as it damaged the fence when it was put up and again when it blew down, we no longer agree to it being attached to our fence and she needs to put up some posts on her side to attach it to. I don't want to wait until they come back to start hammering into the fence again and then have another row. AIBU?