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Need to screen my garden
AnnieAnnie
Posts: 19
My neighbours have cut down several trees which has left my bungalow and garden overlooked by near by houses. I need to plant something in large container that will very quickly grow to eight to nine feet high and five to six foot wide to screen my kitchen window and front door. It could be a tree as there is a six foot fence, but I need to added height to grow above the top of the fence
Any suggestions gratefully received.
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Posts
Not sure a container would work with something eight to nine feet high, not how I'm imagining it in any case.
Have you thought of adding some trellis to extend the fence upwards? Then you could grow some climbers to fill it in?
We have the same problem here that we had a lot of conifers removed (neighbour's insurance company) that were here when we moved in. I didn't really like them and I'm glad they are gone, but it has taken away all privacy. I'm aiming to put up high trellis painted green as a 'fake' hedge then grow things like clematis.
The containers would have to be very big to accommodate trees of that size and would require a lot of watering.
Anything that grows very large very quickly is not just going to stop automatically at 9ft tall and will need regular pruning to keep under control.Just think of the problems people have with Leyladii hedging.
Gemma's suggestion of trellis is very good and would add height to your existing 6ft fence (if you are permitted to go that high) and would give some screening whilst you wait for a climber to grow and fill in the gaps.
If you really want instant privacy buy net curtains.
Containers will not work as even if you are assiduous with watering and feeding it will be top heavy and in the first high winds you will be picking what is left up.
Bamboo can get that tall quickly, if you buy mature specimens.
Some native trees grow fast - Rowan for example but are bare in winter.
Laurel or Leylandii do come to mind as evergreen screening plants but will still take some time to grow 9ft.
You can make raised beds to give an extra 2-3 ft.
put three 10ft posts inside your fence (some footage for concreting in) or possibly two would do, and put 6ft wide by 2ft trellis just at the top of these. Plant some clematis, that might grow through for this summer, and get some advice on here for other plants to be a screen, maybe evergreen something.
Even the trellising would help I should think.
Thanks for all your thoughts on this, but my biggest problem is that I can't plant anything or put posts into the ground as the fence runs along the drive to the garage, so although we do not use the garage ourselves for the car, if we ever sold our bungalow the garage would be useless with a tree planted to prevent getting a car in there and may put off buyers off.
Back to the drawing board, maybe there is a way of fixing trellis to the existing concrete fence posts?
May have to build a car port in front of the garage, that would do the trick and I won't have to water it.
AnnieAnnie can you post a picture up? I think it might help. There are some very clever and resourceful people here and I'm sure someone will come up with a good solution, they always help me when I get stuck with something.
You can drill holes in existing concrete fence posts with a masonary drill bit, then using rawl plugs screw things to them. I don't think it would be needed though. You can get trellis extensions that fit on top of the wooden panels:
http://www.postfix.plus.com/Focus_on_Trellis_Extension_Arm/focus_on_trellis_extension_arm.htm
I'm not particularly recommending this one as I've never used the company, it was just a very clear picture I found showing the idea. You get curved ones too, lots of different designs available.
Gemma, wow, I've never come across those channels, brilliant. this might be just what Annie needs, looks good.
Could be useful in my garden as well !
I'm planning on using the extensions down one side of the garden Jennifer, on the other I'm going for your solution of putting a new fence on our side. That particular fence is very low and just too ugly, so best way will be to hide it completely. I'm thinking of wooden posts, with high panels topped with trellis to make the wall of a 'garden room' around the new patio.
That was a great link to the 'postfix' site. Looks as though none of the brackets for different things need drillling at all, they're fixed by clamping on. I've bookmarked it.
They seem to have lots of good ideas on there, I like their clips for hanging baskets too.