Neighbour has replaced her fence (our border) with low wire fence!

[Missingcaffeine]

So we get on very well with our next door neighbours but they have just taken down their solid 5 ft fence and replaced it with a low 2 ft wire fence. It's our border, but they are responsible for that fence. We have lost all our privacy and I'm now sat in my lounge and can be seen by the neighbours. I don't want to fall out with them, but it has really upset me. I know we can put a fence up our side, but I think that will cause conflict and it would also cost us a lot as it is a long garden. I'd be happy with a trellis/plants - just something to give us some privacy.
They have done it because they have a long narrow garden and want to use our garden to make theirs feel wider - so they are not boxed in. Our garden is much wider, so this would not be an issue for us.
Has this happened to anyone else?
Does anyone have any suggestions of good plants that would give us some privacy, but not cost crazy amounts and are relatively easy to maintain? I'm pregnant and had a toddler - so haven't got much time to maintain the garden but also need to be a bit frugal with money right now! I want to be able to breastfeed and walk around in my pyjamas in my house without feeling self-conscious that my neighbours can see me!

To be honest, I'd be putting a fence up on my side of the border. You don't have to be apologetic if they query it, just polite and firm - you have a toddler and another on the way and need both privacy and security.

I'd put up a fence but if you want to keep the peace. I'd second photinia (red robin). I bout 3 x 8 foot ones for £180 a few years ago and planted them in a row closest to my house to make a border (terrace house with long thin garden so similar issue to your neighbours). It have me privacy in my house / on the patio but still kept an open feeling.

You get a lot of plant for your cash with red robin.

I'd suggest having a chat to the neighbour and explain you are upset about the loss of privacy and the fact your garden isn't secure enough for toddlers any more. Tell them you are going to put up a fence on your side. Say that you are sorry if this bothers them but that you weren't happy with the fence removal and feel you have no choice.

It may well create bad feeling but they didn't consider your feelings in this first place, so don't worry about it.

Blankie, dd you really buy 3 x 8ft trees? I'm thinking about doing something similar but thought I could get away with more trees and less height (say 5ft) as they would grow.

Oh ,I'm sorry this has happened .

My advice (easy to give ,and I'd find it hard to follow ) is to gird you're loins and talk to you neighbours .Explain about your toddler ,lack of privacy ,shock .Say you're thinking of a soloution ,would like their input . If you can't do that ,then write as non confrontational letter as you can .Say you can understand that the fence shades their garden but removing it also causes issues for you .You're looking for a compromise .I,d be very cross indeed ,but it would really be better to try and stay on good terms .

I'm not sure what that compromise might be .
I've seen black bamboo mentioned in similar circumstances ,but it looks a bit pricey to me .www.best4hedging.co.uk/black-bamboo-pp72

I wonder if you could perusde the neighbour to increase the height of the wire mesh to at least 4 ft and make a hedge out of a few sort of specimen plants strategically placed like the forsythia mentioned above ,or bamboo ,with lower growing stuff ( more blushes ,as I'm not a gardener ) scrambling over the mesh in between . Maybe variegated ivy ,I like the cream and white one ,like this www.wyevalegardencentres.co.uk/item/Evergreen-Climbers/Clotted-Cream/BAU

Black bamboo grows incredibly quickly. Run a mile from that stuff, it's stupidly invasive. I've seen it push up an entire patio of 1.5ft sq stone slabs in 3 weeks.

What is on the other side of the garden? Ideally you will want to balance the "look"?

It could be a strategy on their part to a) force you to pay for /share the cost of the fence and b) gain a few inches of garden. If they don't agree to the fence being erected on the boundary line you will have to build it inside it.

The obvious solution is for them if they want more light is to put up a half fence to 4/5 ft with open trellis on top and for one of you then to plant climbers.

I'd start with your deeds.

Oh sorry about duff advice ,never trust an amateur !

It's beautiful stuff just incredibly aggressive. It needs to be planted into a bombproof trough I still have nightmares about it coming up through the kitchen floor 5 years after moving house !

I thought someone had said black bamboo wasn't so invasive ,but perhaps it's all relative

Buddleia grow very quickly, if you planted a few now, you would have plants 5 feet high by the summer.

Surely they can only see in your house if they are in the top part of their garden?

You could buy various pot plants to put on your window ledges on the inside. Or resort to net curtains.

Or just fence the top part by your house.

Bamboo is very swishy and noisy so keep that in mind if it''s near you rhouse. You could put it in tubs by your windows.

I think I'd not rush too fast to do anything - unless paying for a 5ft fence is of little consequence.
You can buy ready grown trees from many suppliers. The measurements for sizy/price are the circumference of the trunk. I've planted a few 10 foot tall trees lately. They aren't very leafy but presume they will grow over time.
You could put up a trellis with Russian Vine on it - it grows metres a year so in future you would be seriously cutting it annually.

Am I the only one wondering if they have ulterior motives when they say use your garden? The amount of cheeky fuckers I have read about, and posted about, it wouldn't surprise me if you come back home early one day, when the weather is nicer to find them in your garden.

bojorojo Our friends have the opposite problem. A wire fence was replaced by their neighbour with 2m high close boarded fencing all the way down the garden. They now never see her. They used to cook for her and she for them. It is bizarre what people do.
Never-ever see her? Can't go and knock on the front door?
We have a brilliant relationship with neighbours, they are like surrogate grandparents to my 5 y.o.DD, we manage to see each other all the time in spite of having a standard fence between our gardens.

However you love your neighbours and do not care about privacy, I can imagine it could grow old having to be sociable and acknowledge your neighbours every time you come out in your garden, I know it would drive me mad!

OP, I would be boiling with rage in your place! How do you know they did it to make their garden feel wider if they never consulted you? Or was it the explanation which was offered afterwards? You really should have said straight away, sorry, but we'll have to do something about it on our side, it doesn't suit us.

We are thinking of buying a house which has a longish garden and a nice view. The prospective house is quite close to the road, while the neighbours' house is half way down "our" garden. In the property listing all the pictures were taken strategically, and only once there we with horror realised that second half of the garden doesn't have anything between the neighbours and this house's garden. It's because there is about 20 trees growing in front of the neighbours' garden (on the land belonging to someone else), and they are completely blocking their view. So they( recent purchasers themselves) asked the old boy who is selling his house to cut down the hedge (to 1ft high maybe) so that they have a view too.

I absolutely hate it and can only contemplate buying that property if we put up a fence/bamboo screens and start planting straight away(we have a toddler too and I can't see who it could work). My husband is worried about starting a war with the neighbours as soon as we move in. It is really putting me off, though for now this house is the only contender in the area. I feel that instead of asking to remove the hedge the neighbours should concentrate on the issue of the trees, then there would be a fabulous view, stupid Leylandi type tree are blocking a pretty hill :(.

I think they are devaluing your property on top of everything else, OP! Lots of people would be massively put off by such a set up. In the house we are looking to buy it's only the second half of the garden which is not private, and that is enough for me to not want to buy otherwise nearly perfect house. :(

Rhonda they're really bushes rather than trees. Pretty easy to plant and they settled really well.

Also, they we're delivered!!

Thank you all for your responses!

So to explain a little further, we live in terraced cottages with long gardens. We have two cottages knocked into one, so our garden is quite wide compared to our neighbours.
The half nearest the house had either trellis with ivy growing over it or 5ft fence, so that half of the garden nearest the house felt private. The end half of the garden was always a 2ft wire fence but we have tall plants halfway down our garden so we had an area of privacy and then a grassy more social area beyond this. I don't mind socialising with my neighbours over the fence, but it's nice to have a small area of privacy. I used to breastfeed my first baby on a little seat with the fence behind it, so that I had complete privacy, but now the fence is removed, I am on view.
The neighbours on the other side of my neighbour have low fence for most of their garden so they can also see into our house/garden now too.
They are all in their gardens a lot and we get on well with them all and always chat, but our house and the bit of the garden near our house has gone from very private to exposed.

She sort of 'asked permission' to remove a couple of the fence panels a while back as they were leaning slightly and told us she could only afford wire fence to replace it. I did express concern about loosing privacy and told her I would want to fill the gaps with plants, but ultimately, I couldn't stop her. At the time this didn't seem so bad as it was only a couple of random panels so we still had some privacy from the panels in-between. Just this week she asked to remove a few more panels because they are not in great condition and she wants one long straight low wire fence - this was while the chap was there to put up the wire fence. I had my neighbour and the fence guy telling me the panel had to come down. I didn't feel I could say no, as they are her panels and they were a bit rotten so I couldn't disagree. I went back after speaking to my partner on the phone and said we'd really like some trellis or something there for privacy and we could help pay. She wasn't happy but said ultimately it's up to us what we do on our side and she can't stop us, but she doesn't really like the idea of trellis/fencing as will feel blocked in. I don't think it's a light thing, I just think she enjoys the view of our beautiful garden - adding colour and interest to hers as her garden is just grass. At this point my teething toddler woke up and I had to sort him out. I watched the guy put up the wire fence and my emotions about this just grew and grew as I was sat on my sofa on full view of my neighbours and the neighbours beyond - where I wasn't previously on view!

The deeds don't say who owns what fence - as the cottages are really old and the records all got burnt in a fire many years ago, so we have no idea. According to neighbours it's 'her' fence, as the neighbours have all told us they are responsible for the fence on the left of their house.

I think because I'm pregnant, I am getting over worked up and emotional about this. Also I'd like to be able to get out there and plant/move things myself right now to sort this out, but I'm too pregnant to be digging/planting and my partner hates gardening (I love it but am clueless!)

This aside, we actually get on really well with our neighbour and we have helped babysit for each other and done lots of favours for each other etc. I don't know that fence is viable option for us now due to cost, conflict and also we would have remove/destroy quite a few beautiful mature plants, as there is no longer space for a fence behind them as there is now the wire fence is running along the boundary.

I think our best option is going to be plants that are nearly or will soon grow to around 5ft high. The plants don't have to completely block everything out, maybe 80%? to give me the sense of privacy, and I definitely don't want anything that's going to be huge, invasive or difficult to prune/maintain. I have some red robin and quite like it, though it does require quite a lot of pruning, but I think I could just about manage this. If there's anything else that is similar but maybe doesn't require quite so much pruning, that would be ideal. I also realised today that I could plant things in our garden elsewhere to give some privacy on my sofa which wouldn't need to be as big due to the perspective.

Sorry for the essay! Some of you sounded interested in the story behind this!

You could maybe put in a structure, like a pergola/gazebo with one side trellised for privacy in one areawww.designrulz.com/design/2013/05/40-pergola-design-ideas-turn-your-garden-into-a-peaceful-refuge/

If you prune shrubs they produce more shoots and get bushier. If you just left something, like a buddleia sp?, they will grow long tall branches and not be so bushy. And if you don't prune things you wont' get into this cycle of pruning every year, but they will prob grow quite tall and maybe a bit straggly but that doesn't matter if they are mainly for privacy. You can put something smaller or tubs in front of them if you wanted to.
What grows might depend on how much sun and rain they get. If they are by your house they will prob be in drier soil but this can also mean they are sheltered by the house and they prob won't get as much frost as if in the garden. But all plants need some sun. Though mahonia will grow in dry shady conditions.

Depending on conditions above you could put in a row of something like different coloured buddleias, or a mix lilac, deutzia, kolkwitzia - these are flowering shrubs. Forsythia grows fast ime, has yellow flowers at this time of year.
A row of Photinia would be good, you could leave it to get tall.
Laurel is evergreen but gets enormous.
Check with the garden centre because some shrubs are bred for small gardens and won't be big enough. The garden centre could prob advise you on suitable plants and how fast they'll grow.

How about one trellis panel, and grow a clematis and jasmine up? The jasmine would be evergreen, and if you get a clematis Montana, they grow like wildfire, but have beautiful pink blooms in May/June and leaves from spring to Autumn.

Just bite the bullet and pay for a full fence the whole length of the garden. It sounds like you didn't put up much of a fight, but your neighbour has ignored your wishes and done exactly what she wanted. I couldn't live in a house with no privacy in the garden.

Have you considered bamboo screening for the area you would like to be private?
It would be cheaper than fencing and be easier to fit

I would be concerned that she did this right in your face knowing it wasn't what you wanted. I think that gives you a clue about what kind of histrionics might ensue when you reinstate the fence and your privacy. I would therefore do it immediately to leave absolutely no doubt or room for argument. Can you have it done in sections as you can afford it, but making clear it will all be done?

Honestly, I think you need to just put up your own fence. This will rankle and upset you and the children need to be safe in your garden. A wire fence or bushes won't do.

I don't know whether all 'black bamboo' is the same, but it's definitely being sold in Homebase at the moment, described as clumping, not invasive. They also sell Golden Bamboo which they are describing as spreading, so there must be a difference.

TreadSoftly, do you know exactly what sort you had?

OP, until you get the funds and make a plan, could you do something with a few fence posts and use willow screening roll between them?

You can get bamboo fencing from pound stretchers! You don't have to spend thousands, but something like that would give you privacy.

We have black bamboo. Just a clump to cover the view of our neighbour's back door/their view of us from the back door. We planted it in a hole lined with some sort of mesh. It has taken a few years to get much of a clump over 6', so it doesn't seem very quick to form a decent barrier. We nearly got a bit of regular bamboo from my parents instead, but we couldn't dig it up as it was growing through concrete . I think that was a lucky escape.