Removal of laurel hedge but loss of privacy

nbr

Hi

I have recently bought a house in which big part of the back garden is occupied by a laurel hedge that sits at the bottom of the garden, next to our rear neighbours' garden fence. I would like to remove the whole laurel hedge to give me more space and less maintenance and replace it with some golden leyland as suggested by my landscaper.

The worry is that the minimum height the leylands come with is 3 fts and it will take a couple of season for them to grow at a reasonable privacy height. The garden is also a bit on a slope, so the visibility between the two gardens will be even higher when the laurel hedge has been removed. I have also thought about putting some temporary green fencing or trellis on top of the existing fence, but the fence is property of the neighbours as per solicitors paperwork.


The other option is to prune the existing laurel but what I will be left with is wooden branches without many leaves. The garden space will also not increase by much since the trunk of the laurel is at least 1 metre from the fence.

I would really like to use my garden with its real area but on the other hand do not want to lose privacy which the neighbours as well have been used to for years.

Any suggestion based on similar experiences would be really appreciated.

valk_scot

Talk to the neighbours? They might hate your laurel too and be happy to let you extend the fence temporarily. They might not be so happy about the suggestion of golden leylands though. Don't they grow really, really tall, or am I thinking of the wrong plant here? I think it needs very regular cutting to keep it under control.

lostinrates

How thick will the golden leylandeii grow? I've never seen them, but we reoved some normal ones from here that were takig a darn load more than a metre from the depth of our garden!

Have you thought about something different altogether? I'm considering some pleached trees in the future http://www.google.co.uk/images?q=pleached+trees&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=cd0&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=ivns&source=lnms&tbs=isch:1&ei=rzqSTZXvHpOxhQe65ZyhDw&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&ved=0CBwQ_AUoAQ&biw=1045&bih=485

splodger_seedswapper

if you cut laurel back hard - even if the stems are quite woody - it will shoot from below, so will thicken up (it is when laurel is cut back enough that it gets all "woody")

did you know that if you put laurel logs and branches on the ground (even if they are severed from the parent plant) they are about 85% likely to shoot up and grow themselves. granted, this does take a bit of time for them to take - but they will grow at that lower level - you could also use a technique similar to hedge laying - and just cut half way into the longer lengths of laurel and try to layer them - and they will create new lower growth for you - what i am tring to say is that there are actually loads of tricks you can use - to get laurel to bush up where there might be just bare wood at the minute

as for leylandeii - no comment :eek:

[Deleted User]

leylandii replacing laurel. Unbelievable, Do some research on leylandii first. Terrible plant

ginvzt

I couldn't believe landscaper suggested laylandii -probably he is looking for more work from you in near future, when you will be asking him to come and trim/prune the leylandiis, and in a few years remove them completely and suggest something else.

We removed 6 leylandiis recently from our garden, and the change is unbelievable. The garden is so much lighter and so much bigger in an instant! And we are not replacing them with anything else like it. We are putting some dwarf fruit trees (grow up to 2.4m, apple, pear, cherry, plum) and then having raised beds.

When I mentioned to our neighbour that we are removing the leylandiis, he said he quite liked them. I had to hold myself not to suggest he plants them on his side of the fence then - they we over 1.3m wide! So, where I had 3 leylandiis growing, I am now going to have 2 raised beds to grow veg/flowers, cherry tree and probably an apple one.

Privacy is not something that I am after in a small garden - I would rather have more light and space, and say hello to my neighbours.

choille

Before you do anything totally drastic like ripping out established plants I think you need to sack your landscaper & leave stuff for a year to see what comes up. Gardening isn't like the telly, it isn't instant.

aliasojo

nbr wrote: »

I would like to remove the whole laurel hedge to give me more space and less maintenance and replace it with some golden leyland as suggested by my landscaper.

Is this a 'real' landscaper or an armchair one? Leylandii are far from low maintenance and need very regular cutting to stop excess height and keep shape. They can be subject to wind damage and the woody damaged areas will not regrow.

We had the golden version (which is supposed to be slower growing) in the front garden and the ordinary green in the back garden. Both were a pain. As others have said, it's not just the height which is an issue, they grow wide too and take up a fair strip of garden, you wont save any space by taking up the laurel and replacing with leylandii.

Perhaps consider bamboo? I think I'm right in saying these are not as wide but will still add height and some privacy.

http://www.junglegiants.co.uk/Bamboo_for_screening_and_hedging.htm

sunshinetours

aliasojo wrote: »

Is this a 'real' landscaper or an armchair one? Leylandii are far from low maintenance and need very regular cutting to stop excess height and keep shape. They can be subject to wind damage and the woody damaged areas will not regrow.

We had the golden version (which is supposed to be slower growing) in the front garden and the ordinary green in the back garden. Both were a pain. As others have said, it's not just the height wich is an issue, they grow wide too and take up a fair strip of garden, you wont save any space by taking up the laurel and replacing with leylandii.

Perhaps consider bamboo? I think I'm right in saying these are not as wide but will still add height and some privacy.

http://www.junglegiants.co.uk/Bamboo_for_screening_and_hedging.htm

Yep agree with all of above. Leylandi are not low mainteneance if you wish to keep them looking nice and under control

Bamboo is the way we are going in our garden - just make sure its a clump forming one and you take barrier precautions to stop it becoming invasive. You can also grow it in a container so you can move it if necessary. Provides evergreen screening without being too thick (so cutting out others light) and sounds lovely in the wind. Very easy to maintain aswell

The MSE way will be to prune your laurel back hard and wait for a year to see how it regrows

Davesnave

The landscaper isn't necessarily wrong. A lot of people commenting here are the 'armchair experts.'

I had 7 golden leylandii as a screen within my garden for the best part of 20 years and kept them trimmed to about 1m at the base and 4m tall. This required the application of a hedge trimmer once a year + a bit of secateur work on the top. I was consistent in doing that. People who have problems with leylandii probably aren't willing to admit that they fall short on the maintenance front.

That said, as others have pointed out, get a die-back area on a leylandii and it won't re-grow, nor will it take kindly to being pushed up against an existing fence, where the parts not receiving sunlight will surely die back. Also, if you park one close to a boundary, your neighbour will have that trimming job as his/her problem too. Is that fair?
My screen was deliberately within the garden so I could get at both sides.

For the above reasons, I'd say that the suggestion of bamboo could be a good one, but only if it's contained, or if something like paving slabs on edge are sunk in front of it. That stuff can go through most defences.

For the moment, I'd bear in mind what choille and sunshinetours say and see how the reduced laurel goes. It won't take long to recover. If you find you can't live with it, you can do the research and decide which way to go in the meantime.

aliasojo

Davesnave wrote: »

I had 7 golden leylandii as a screen within my garden for the best part of 20 years and kept them trimmed to about 1m at the base and 4m tall. This required the application of a hedge trimmer once a year + a bit of secateur work on the top. I was consistent in doing that. People who have problems with leylandii probably aren't willing to admit that they fall short on the maintenance front.

Yes I am only an armchair gardener but with respect, if it was only once a year that these things needed attention then I doubt very much people (including me) would even comment about the amount of work involved in looking after leylandii. I'm surprised you only had to see to yours so little. I wonder if the 4 m height had something to do with it? Ours were kept at between 2.5 - 3 m so perhaps more growth was spreading wideways since the height was reduced? I have no idea really, all I know is ours were something that needed a lot of attention.

I got so fed up trimming mine that I ended up getting a local chap in to do it for me before we finally heeded advice and got them taken out. Also, the root systems of these things are sizeable, we still have the occasional problem years later when we buy some new plant or other and still need to dig out loads of old root before we can plant the thing.