Neighbour hacking off boughs - conservation area

[JennyForeigner]

Hi all, grateful for your expertise.

We live in a listed house in a conservation area with a beautiful garden and mature trees. We are good tree owners, having them annually checked and trimmed, and have removed unsuitable overgrown Leylandii with roots too close to houses.

We have had new neighbours for a couple of years. We have worked hard to get on well with them but they have upset people by replacing the grass verge at the front of their house with plastic mat without permission, lots of cars and basically being a bit tasteless in a community people move to for its greeness and wildlife. They have massively extended at the back without keeping within the permissions granted. The male half of the couple told me he plans to pave and AstroTurf their garden, and that he dislikes our (rather beautiful) garden because of the 'messy' plants. We have 8 foot fences.

About six months ago he asked if they could take down the overhanging boughs from a line of lovely trees including silver birch on our side of the boundary. He considers these 'untidy.'

I said that we understood it was his right to ask and that if he wanted to work with our tree surgeon would not object. Under a bit of pressure from him I agreed that if he had a preferred tree surgeon we would meet them and provided we were satisfied, allow them to work in our garden. I felt uncomfortable about this afterwards as I felt what he really wanted was to get some dodgy mate around.

Today I saw him up a ladder, sawing through one of the larger boughs from our silver birch. He had given no thought at all to how to do this properly, or minimising damage to the tree. We have been in all day and he didn't attempt to speak to us.

My husband now feels I was unreasonable for asking him why he didn't knock on our door and ask before getting his saw out. He stopped, but was not nice about it and I am now really quite unhappy. I don't believe for a minute that he would have stopped if I hadn't caught him, while we have three very young children and the trees are in a built up bed by the fence where there is a substantial level change. There is a risk that the trees will become unbalanced and unsafe, as well as looking awful.

I am frankly furious, especially as we have been so thoughtful and accommodating.

AIBU to tell him he can do one if he ever so much as mentions working on our land again?

And am I right to think he should have had permission before the work took place as we are in a conservation area? I am not sure about this, but would love it if I could tell him no on this basis. We have always had permission before getting our tree surgeon in, but as we have been taking leylandii out, I'm not sure if this is what the permission is for.

Would really appreciate any guidance people can give. AIBU?

Can I cut off overhanging branches?
Yes, provided it is done without trespassing onto the other person’s property. It is also permissible to climb into the tree to undertake the work, again so long as it does not require going into the neighbour’s garden/land. Note that trees covered by a Tree Preservation Order (TPO) or in a Conservation Area will require prior consent from the local authority.
www.rhs.org.uk/plants/types/trees/the-law

Complain to the council tree officer. Is their house equally in the Conservation Area?

Have you applied for permission for your previous tree works?

Why didn't you report their rear extension before if it breaches the plans?

They should have had permission from the council to cut off any branches, even of their own trees.

Thank you @Icantstopthisfeeling that's what I thought.

My husband has just told me he has been round for a 'man to man' chat. He wants us to remove the trees because he is 'losing light' from the mega extension completed three months ago. My husband, who is a wet dishrag, said of course we would be happy to talk about it.

That's it for me. Over my dead body are we chopping down lovely healthy mature shade trees that have been kept to an appropriate low height because some idiot wants to pretend he lives in Dubai.

one VERY easy answer to this is don’t have your trees hanging over Into other peoples garden
problem solved

If you are concerned about their extending and changing the appearance the contact your local planning enforcement department at your local county council. They will send someone out if it's a conservation area.

(Idiot near us installed a bloody great air conditioning unit on the front of their house and have now had to have it all ripped out.)

This is really helpful, thank you.

Firstly, they hardly did. The trees are well-managed to grow upwards, so that they crossed his boundary at the top - about 15 feet up. He removed the whole bough close to the trunk - so on our side.

Secondly, our house is 600 years old and listed. His is 30 years old and built on what was once part of our garden. He claims he is 'losing light' from trees which used to be more than half way down his garden - because he built an enormous mega extension. Those trees are probably 70 years older than the house he chose and bought two years ago.

Lastly, our old neighbours rented that house and loved them. As soon as the new owner decided he didn't like them we agreed to do any work necessary to cut them back - on his time frame. He decided to ignore that offer and according to my mum who saw him, damn well nearly killed himself on the ladder when one of the boughs came down.

Are you saying that he’s cut the tree branches down illegally or something? He is perfectly within his rights to cut anything that overhangs his property. I also assume he had planning permission to build his extension?

You need to speak to your council tree planning team. They’re not allowed to cut trees in a Conservation Area without permission. And if he asks you to cut your trees down again, tell him to do one.

Well you've tried the nice way, he didn't like that way. Now, it's planning department, council re the trees, just as churlish and petty as you like.

I am of the opinion that you give people lots of nice but if they don't like that I get very direct, very quickly.

How the hell was he allowed to build a ‘mega extension’ in a conservation area?! Our local conservation officers are absolute Rottweilers and will not let anything but the most conservative PP request pass!

This is in my post - we have always been very careful and have supplied a full list of works every year. Our tree surgeon lives at the farm at the end of our road so doesn't mess about. That said, I didn't know if we had cited maintenance because we needed formal permission, or whether we had given the list out of completeness while applying to remove one leylandii at a time. From the answers I now know it was the former.

Good question on why we didn't report. I can only say we questioned ourselves - our house is listed so everything we do is carefully inspected and assessed. We knew we didn't have grounds to object to the extension. We were very surprised when it was constructed with a floor to ceiling plate glass panel overlooking our kitchen, but we genuinely assumed we must have mis-read the original plans.

After his pushing over the trees I think our instinct was right and am going to try to confirm and complain. I'm getting a sense he is one of those who just always goes a bit beyond the line.

It's also frankly horrible. The permission was for an ugly but reasonable extension with a slate roof and remediation to blend in with the rest of the building. What is there is bare breeze-block with cheap non-matching concrete roof tiles. We're increasingly worried he is just a bit of a cowboy - which was fine, till he started hassling us to remove any kind of screen between our houses.

Thank you - yes, it is. Our whole village is, being the former estate houses of an old hall, with some less attractive modern in-fill properties. There's is one of those and approx 30 years old.

Well, he cut them on our side of the boundary, without conservation area permission and didn't offer the boughs back, so yes, that's what I've clarified from this thread.

The planning question explained above. We were unsure, but I'm increasingly minded to think he sees any permissions as a guideline, not as binding.

This is solid advice for life, thank you.

Key bit being he came into your garden to do it?

Honestly I don't know! It is such an ugly house and that's not being mean. Everyone including the owners recognised that it is very unattractive and needed wholesale improvement, which they pitched. The drawings were for the extension at the back but we think without windows on our side, but also for the whole building to be redone and rendered, with a new and much superior frontage.

None of it has been delivered apart from the floor area of the extension in breeze-block, and with a massive window on our wide which means we now have see an 80 inch TV permanently blaring colour 8 ft away from our kitchen window. And our house is grade 2a listed, including the garden views of the property.

This thread has been a real wake up call. We've been boiled frogs, assuming someone from the council must be joining the dots and approving things. I now feel really stupid and worried and will be straight on the phone to them tomorrow.

You have three things to address:
-your DH needs to be told to toughen up, quickly!
-report the extension to the council
-report the illegal tree cutting to the council

When was the extension built?

Why haven't you complained about this?

They have massively extended at the back without keeping within the permissions granted.

That's a major problem!

No, he climbed on our fence and reached over. My mum says he had to grab at the bough he cut to guide it over the fence on the way down, presumably because the weight was on our side of the boundary.

And again, without permission to cut the tree in a conservation area. He knows about it, because the village association have had words about things like his removing grass and verge at the front. Again, without permission.

Please do keep us informed of what the council say, I detest people like this

All of these.

My husband also called in pest control last week - and paid £200 - because our other neighbour had seen rats in his garden 'heading to ours'.

He is a gentle kind man but an absolute mug sometimes. And people get away with what they can.