Can you grow shrubs along a hedge

We have a hedge which is 'poor man's box' (identified for me on here actually by you lovely lot!) http://oregonstate.edu/dept/ldplants/images/loni8.jpg In the picture it is in its untrimmed state - ours is cut into a hedge, looks like box hedging.

The trouble is that we have new neighbours - which we hate! We've already been round once to ask them to turn down their music at eleven at night. Having put up with an awful lot of late night music, usually followed by a MASSIVE row and then slamming doors we have written a letter telling them how much distress their noise is causing us. (No wonder their kids don't know how to behave!) As soon as they moved in, in February, they took it upon themselves to drastically cut down the hedge between us. He just goes straight along with his hedge trimmer, doing a square cut, and has taken about a foot off the top all the way along, so they can now see into our garden easily, and we have lost all our privacy. (It is now about 4 foot)

In the letter we asked him if he would leave our side of the hedge, as it is much shorter than it has ever been. But frankly, relying on him to actually do this is stupid, given that he is in control of how much privacy we get in our garden.

Now we have the chickens we love to just sit out with them and pop up and see what they're up to, when we get watched by our neighbours and feel very much on view.

So... to my question... can you plant shrubs next to a hedge? Meaning, do we just let the hedge grow into the shrubs and trim it back between shrubs, or will this type of hedge grow 'into' the shrubs? Does anyone have any idea.

We are definitely willing to lose some space for the shrubs - as we want our garden to be private and be able to enjoy it.

Then, if it will work, what to plant? Something that is green all year round would be wonderful, but not totally essential, and grows to eight foot in a month or two?!!! (OK, maybe that's asking too much!!)

It would be nice to make a line of shrubs, all different, some flowering maybe, that will give us back our garden. I guess quick growing is the key, or cheap to buy large in the first place.

Any help to my rambling post would be very gratefully received! k-l

 

What a horrible situation, Victoria.
Nobody needs bad neighbours.
Does the hedge belong to your nieghbour ? If it does he can cut it all he likes - right down to the ground if he wants.
If it is your hedge then he can only cut anything which overhangs his property and should leave the height alone.
I think you have to determine who is the owner of the hedge.
Are you planning to stay there long term ?
If so I would bight the bullet and bear the expense of putting up a fence.
Good fences make good neighbours.
The fence would belong to you - (both sides). - People don't own what they see as THEIR side of the fence, or hedge. It belongs to the person whose ground it is on.
You could then plant any climbers you like on that fence , you would have your privacy back and if your neighbour wanted to slaughter the hedge that would be up to him.
I hope you can find an amicable resolution to all this. Horrible to be at war with neighbours. I would fork out for the fence for the sake of peace.

 

I agree with Alice about putting up a fence. A quick and reliable way to give yourself some privacy...and then you can forget about who owns the hedge, the right to cut it and the height it needs cutting!

Added bonus with chickens - with a fence, you have added protection for them. If these chavs, sorry neighbours decide to get a dog and said dog decides to come and vist your chickens, you'll be devastated; even if it only stalks them, you won't get any peace of mind. You can also grow whatever you want up your fence, paint it whatever colour you want and have complete privacy. You don't mention lack of sunlight being an issue, so a fence wouldn't give any more problems that a shrub 'hedge' would (and you can still grow the shrubs as well!).

Have a google for cheap fence panels - there are plenty out there.

 

If only it were that simple! It is on the left side, which I believe is our boundary, but they are renting the house next door. The hedge provides a lot of sound proofing, and unfortunately, having 3 small children, we are not in a position to pay for 15 metres of fencing.

I do see the idea as being a solution, but not one we can stretch to.

We moved in a year and a half ago, and it has been paradise. We love it here and don't intend to move. Such a shame that an awful lot of people don't care one bit about considering others.

So I am stuck with shrubbing it out!

 

If they are renting, complain to the landlord or estate agent.

I found somewhere online that does 10 fence panels (6 foot each) for £168 including delivery. That's 20 metres (I think, maths is not my string point). Is that too much?

For quick growing shrubs, Buddleia springs to mind of course!

 

They already have two dogs, which are left in the front gatden 24/7! They have their beds in the front porch.

I think for the moment the hedge has to stay, I just want to pad it out - and up!

In an ideal world I'd fence it then plant shrubs etc, but it's too much to undertake financially and labour wise.

Any more problems from them and I will contact their landlord, I have his mobile number and landline from the previous tennants! Plus the estate agents details.

 

Unfortunately, in my experience, complaining to the landlord or estate agent is a waste of time. They're both seeing their property purely as a source of money. (I won't get started on buy-to-lets. Let's just say I wouldn't be devastated if the landlord of the slum next door to me caught something very, very nasty.) Having said this, a friend up the road from me did manage to get the tenants next door to her evicted, but not before she had camped out at the estate agent's office and threatened to throw a chair through the plate glass window. (She is normally a nice, level-headed girl who works as a matron in an A & E department but the neighbours literally drove her loopy.)

A sturdy fence is a very good investment. Beg or borrow the money if necessary and get it in place as soon as possible. Resist the temptation to get into too many disputes with your neighbours as chavs are born with an in built persecution complex and generally see a polite letter asking them to turn the music down a bit as a major insult which must be avenged. They teach their kids to parrot 'I ain't dun nuffin - it's all the uvver bloke's fault' whilst still in the cradle. Take comfort in the fact that chavs have the attention span of fleas and generally move house every three weeks.

 

I'd beg, borrow or steal the money to be in control of the situation.
Otherwise you are at their mercy.
Which way do you want to do it?

 

Directional speakers on a feed back loop pointed at their house so that every loud noise is amplified straight back to them, including dogs barking, loud music & arguements.

Sorry, thats not very helpfull, but it does drive you mad when they totally ignore the effects they are having on neighbours.

I'd get the council environmental people round & get them threatened with an asbo. Good luck.

 

If you contact the environmental people, they generally tell you to keep a noise diary. The noise nuisance has to be sustained and regular for them to take any action at all. Short, irregular bursts of ear-splitting din at three in the morning don't count. After you have devoted a large chunk of your life to keeping the damn diary, it slowly begins to dawn on you that it is largely a waste of time and has achieved nothing other than to wind you up further. At one time we were in a particularly interesting position in that the tenants next door were dumped on us by the Ministry of Justice, which responded to our complaints by explaining that offenders on HDC 'need somewhere decent to live'. I replied saying that we did too and that it was extremely difficult to get a small company through a recession whilst suffering from sleep deprivation. No response was forthcoming. (The scheme to drop up to five offenders/homeless bailees into ordinary houses and then wave goodbye is currently being extended. Beware.)

Get that fence up somehow, Victoria Plum, but think twice before making official complaints as they might make it difficult for you to sell your house should you decide to call it a day. Personally I'm praying for a lottery win so that I can buy a house where the nearest neighbours are several miles away.

 

Thanks Clare, I really feel for your situation. And Aaron thank you for doing the fence search! I think deflective speakers would be a total bonus, but alas only the kind of thing I decide to do as I fall asleep at night, and then realise it's a no-go in the morning!

What makes it worse, is that we left the last place because we had students living next door, and had to go through environmental health. We had the recording equipment, the diary, the lot! They made several attempts at contacting them regarding the noise and sent letters, made visits etc. They were in the process of tracking the landlord when we moved, but he clearly didn't give a damn.

It's a bit different here, as where we lived before we were near a university, and the whole city was becoming a giant campus. Thank god we got out!! But one woman has already been evicted from the flat on the end of our row because she was noisy and the tenant below complained (although she was also a tenant of the same landlord) Our house is semi detatched, and the one next to us has been bought and then, because they have so much land around them, two flats have been joined onto the end, making next door a mid terrace.

When we moved in it was empty, then two weeks later a nice family moved in and we became friends. Then they moved out and here we are! Funnily enough, I saw a lady at the school sports day who asked how I was getting on with the new neighbours., She said she was a friend of hers and had previously lived next door to her, but had to move because she made her life hell - now she has a new boyfriend and lives next door to me! She owned the property before with her ex husband - this time I guess she has to behave to en extent, or they'll get thrown out.

Sometimes I feel like we are the ones with the problem, because it has happened twice to us now. That somehow we should be living in a detached house somewhere but our budget doesn't allow. I think that is the worst thing, that when you have done nothing wrong, because you stand up for your family and politely ask the chavs to be considerate, you are made to feel like you are the one with the problem! And I absolutely hate the bad feeling, it makes you so depressed to be in your own home. One of the worst things has been the noise coming through the wall to our bedroom while she has her ankles round her neck! Wasn't there a program on TV called 'Faking It!?!' I mentioned that in the letter too - saying I was sure they didn't want people hearing that! Of course at first we had that uncomfortable situation where they didn't look in our direction and we didn't look in theirs, and given the new lower hedge that was really horrid. But they have been friendly again this last couple of weeks, which at least takes away the feeling that you can't even go into your own garden.

Since I took the letter round, they have in fairness been quiet, but I guess I am so sensitive to it that I am just waiting for it to start. They weren't noisy to start with, just too keen with the hedge trimmer! I've been told that the estate agents are very hard on these tenants, and we live in a quiet village, where I hope they would not get away with it for long. The lady who used to live next door has advised me to go to the estate agent before the landlord, as they are so strict about things. I'm sure they wouldn't be happy about the dog situation either.

Who knows, anyway - I know that for the moment we cannot afford to fence it, at the earliest next year, and I might as well plant some shrubs along there (incase they move out!) and I can always move the shrubs to put the fence up next year.

So far I've moved a Berberis round from the front garden, planted a Kerria which my mum grew from a cutting and is nearly up to the hedge height. I've also spotted some large Sumac suckers down the road, and have this morning got permission to go and dig some up!

Does anyone else have any ideas? It will be slightly sheltered from the hedge, but will get full sun once it gets to hedge height, at the top. Quick growing is the key!!!

 

Nasty neighbours seem to be the modern scourge, don't they? So many people seem to have similar stories. At least your neighbours are quiet for the moment and attempting to be friendly. You might not feel like being particularly matey back, but it's a good sign. We've had the - ahem - 'bedroom noise' problem. At first we thought the neighbours were doing DIY at three in the morning but it turned out to be a different form of banging. I love my house - a 'Coronation Street' Victorian terraced - but I would never buy another home which shares party walls will the neighbouring house. I'd rather stick with the devil I know until such time as I can afford a detached house (which may well be never!). Going upmarket doesn't necessarily save you - we have friends who recently bought a lovely, five bedroomed Victorian semi in a seemingly genteel road. Unfortunately the vendors forgot to mention the Neighbours From Hell.

I think thorny shrubs are good if you're feeling under threat - they give you a psychological edge! How about some large, lethally-armed shrub roses? Rugosas would be good. They're tough, grow quickly and you'll get lots of lovely scented flowers and some hips later in the season.

 

PS 'Blanc Double de Coubert' would be nice. It smells wonderful, grows fast and has the most fearsome thorns. Peter Beales says it grows to five feet but I think it will shoot up higher than than if you let it.

 

Thanks Clare - I'll look into those. Hopefully the berberis will bush out in time. The soil seems quite moist there (not too moist) and the hedge should protect against frost so hopefully things should take ok.

I've been and dug up a five foot Sumac and put that in - although the root is shallow and obviously it had suckered from parent plant - let's hope it takes!!

 

Oh dear Vicki that sounds a nightmare!

I understand where you are comig from re. fencing and the expense, although it does sound the best solution. If they are trying to be quiet, and are more friendly lately, it may be prudent to try and build on the 'friendliness' as maddening as it is. After all it sounds like they have heeded some of what you have said, and if they were totally pig headed they could have carried on, or even been worse just for spite and the hell of it. It may work.... it may not.
Meantime, a nice variagated holly sounds an idea, but I guess that might be too slow growing for you? You could also use some at Christmas, and the birds will love the berries :wink: Watch the Sumac......they send runners everywhere. Im still getting sumacs coming up in my lawn from next doors tree, nice as it is. I got rid of mine years ago for that reason. Good luck! Keep us posted :thumb:

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