My neighbour’s tree is blocking sunlight to my garden.

Arsenal2019

Hi guys.

Well not technically my neighbours, but people live round the back of us, at the other side of the dirt track, approximately 5 metres from our garden is there garden fence, where these 3 huge trees (approx 15 metre tall).

The trees block out sunlight for most of the day, meaning we lose the sun around 3PM, whereas we could have it until the evening.

Not only do they block out the sun, they are also an eye sore.

Yes; I understand they’ve got them for privacy, but is there anything we can do.

Can we take a couple of metres off or get the council involved? Is there anything?!?!

Gloomendoom

Ask them if they will take a bit off the top? That is what my neighbours did... and I chopped the whole tree down.

As far as I am aware, there is no right to light in a garden.

bris

There is no right to light.

Fire_Fox

Communicate with and negotiate with your neighbours rather than initiate a dispute.

Mistral001

Offer to get it pruned at your cost. However even though you will be paying for it you need the tree's owner's permission to get it done.. If they refuse you cannot touch any branches that are not over hanging your property, which pretty much means that you cannot get the tree's height reduced.

Davesnave

These trees are 5m+ from your property and unlikely to be seriously overhanging it, so unless they're unsafe, there is little you can do if their owner doesn't want them trimmed.

Not having sprung up overnight, the trees may already be protected by a council order. Far from getting trees cut down, most councils do their best to see that landscape trees are preserved.


The only exception to the above is where the trees are evergreen and form a hedge, where the provisions of the High Hedges Act might apply. It's fairly complex and not a quick or cheap fix, so you'd need to Google it. However, we don't even know what kind of trees these are, so that info may be irrelevant.

Arsenal2019

Hi.

Thanks so much for the replies.

They are conifers and appear to make a hedge like figure, just a very tall one!!!

LadyDee

https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=408

sevenhills

Richardroberts1 wrote: »

The trees block out sunlight for most of the day, meaning we lose the sun around 3PM, whereas we could have it until the evening.

Not only do they block out the sun, they are also an eye sore.

You have sun untill 3pm, that is better than many. I would never call a tree an eyesore, I much prefer trees that attract more wildlife, but you might be in with a chance if your neighbours share your view.

Ozzuk

When I moved house our neighbour had conifers probably 30-40 feet high. I did look into the legality of the height and did find something about if there are 3 or more trees it could be considered a hedge and therefore governed by restrictions in height - so you could force a reduction.

However, I decided I quite liked them, and I'd bought the house with them in place so really didn't have a moral right to object so I didn't investigate further, but it is something you could explore. The fact they aren't on your boundary may be a show stopper though.

In my case the neighbours sold their house, the new owners asked if we would mind if they halved the height of the trees, so happy all round

Poppycat68

These are leyandii trees - and they can't now be trimmed that much - they can only be trimmed to where it stops being green or you get dead wood and destroys the tree.

They are loved and hated and why the High Hedges Act came into being.

They live for about 100 years. so you may have to learn to love them