Neighbour wants me to cut down a tree

[Cantyouseeimanaubergine]

Next door neighbour has asked me to cut down a tree. It’s an established tree, tall as the house. It’s halfway down the garden and at the border. She says it drops debris onto her decking and she’s always having to sweep and clean stuff off her garden furniture. (She has a decked seating area half way down her garden). She says it blocks light to her garden too.
I like the tree and don’t want to cut it down.
she’s a good neighbour, often passing us freshly baked goodies and doing our bins when we are away. I suspect she’ll change if we say no.
is there any compromise here?

Don’t cut the rowan down. They keep the witches away.

Oh honestly, from your description and excellent diagram, she's making a big fuss about bugger all. A bit of debris on her decking, boohoo, get a grip. We should treasure these trees, not chop them down. Rowan trees are a great source of late summer/autumn food for birds.

I do agree though with @Flatandhappy that if you organise the reduction of branches on her side you will have control over how much is removed.

People wanting to cut trees down baffles me.

The garden next to mine has a lovely, very established fir tree bang in the middle of it, which is way taller than the house. Yes, it puts my south-facing lawn into shade when it should have evening sun, but the only 'problem' with that is it curtails my sunbathing from about 17:00. So it's actually doing it's bit for air purity and my skin health.

Re. your neighbour, OP - surely building decking under an established tree (when you like a tidy garden) is more illogical than the existence of the tree itself! 🤷🏻‍♀️ Tell her that daily sweeping is good for her core and she's welcome.

Someone near me has a lovely TPO’d birch in their garden. The next door neighbours didn’t like leaves and debris dropping on their car, so they engaged some random going door to door to literally chop half the tree off. Both the neighbours and the tree surgeon tree butcher are being prosecuted.

We have 2 trees with TPOs. Honestly I don’t love them due to sap and needles/ cones but I also appreciate that our neighbourhood looks as nice as it does because of all the trees, so I work with a great tree surgeon to minimise the impact on the house and it works well. I got permission to crown one pretty high ( 4 metres) and on the other to lop branches overhanging the drive ( stops sap and pigeon shit on cars). Trees both still fine and shape maintained. I’d try to find a compromise.

Maybe invoice her for using your tree as a shade?

If you’re in the UK, check with your Local Authority to ask if it can be subject to a TPO (tree protection order) - then you won’t be allowed to remove it. It’s a native species, so you might be in with a chance!

@Cantyouseeimanaubergine Leaving aside some of the suggestions here, these kind of issues with trees on boundaries can become incredibly acrimonious. Personally, my approach would be a firm refusal to cut the tree down, but tell her you’ll get a tree surgeon in to look at reducing the impact on her.

9/10 times in these situations, the neighbour has been festering about it for months so by the time they approach you, they’ve worked themselves up for an argument. You can easily deflate this by sympathising and offering to look at solutions rather than immediately getting defensive in response.

I’ve had a similar situation with a neighbour wanting my mature tree cut down to prevent shade on his patio at certain times of day, but I’ve always refused and made a big point of ensuring the tree is maintained so he has no reasonable complaint.

If I have remembered correctly leylandii grow away from pruning (most other trees grow towards pruning). Our neighbours had a leylandii hedge which they didnt maintain. We pruned our side so over time the hedge pulled away from us. When new neighbours moved in they removed the hedge and were shocked to double the size of their garden.

We have recently asked our neighbour to cut their tree (not chop it down completely) as it's taller than our house and blocks all of our afternoon/evening sun. Our gardens are pretty small so the tree does have a big impact. The tree was there when we bought the house 6 years ago but had obviously grown a lot since then. Our other neighbour asked us to cut our own tree and we did straight away as we wouldn't want to spoil anyone's enjoyment of their garden!

The compromise is to cut your tree so it is shorter and make sure it doesn't overhang her garden.

I’d have a tree surgeon over and see what can be done

the tree was there when she bought the house. She was daft to put decking under it. But I’d try and compromise to save neighbourly relation.

I would cut t back.it is miserable having a huge tree cutting out all your sun

I think YABU to say you won't trim the overhand over her garden - you don't have the right to encroach into her airspace, but YANBU to say no to removing the tree entirely.

But she is entitled to cut the overhanging branches on her side so she should just do that herself.