Best hedging to have close to house ...

MimiJane

Hi all,

After a bit of advice here please ...

Our house has a walk-way along the side of it, hidden by a Leylandi hedge and a very large conifer at the end of the hedge right up against the house. We plan to remove all of this due to any future foundation damage.

Having checked with the Council, we cannot erect a fence/wall any higher than 1 metre, which we're not happy about at all due to lack of privacy. We're also anxious to keep the cost down and have been wondering about running an evergreen hedge parallel to the walkway and replacing the existing hedge and conifer. We could perhaps erect a temporary (low) fence while it grows.

This would obviously be a lot cheaper, but we're concerned about any possible future root damage to the foundations of the house as the hedge would go right up to the house.

Can anyone suggest a shrub that would be suitable for this purpose?

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Mimi x

~Chameleon~

Why not just leave the existing conifers in place and have them trimmed to a reasonable height? Depending how tall they are now you might cause more problems trying to get roots etc out than leaving them in situ and restricting further growth

MimiJane

We've been advised by a reputable structural engineering company that they need to be removed. A local arborist company could easily remove the roots, so we're looking for a new hedge with a root system that isn't so extensive.

Even if we did keep the existing hedge, there would still be a large gap where the conifer tree is up against the house, so the idea is to have a continuous hedge up to the house without an extensive root system (if possible!).

[Deleted User]

In that case I'd choose a shrub, possibly one with thorns to deter intruders, like Firethorn (Pyracantha Saphyr Orange), which is evergreen and has lovely white flowers in the spring and orange or red berries in the autumn.

Other non-thorny shrubs for you to consider would be Photinia (Photinia x fraseri Red Robin), Portuguese Laurel (Prunus lusitanica) or Mexican Orange Blossom.

MimiJane

Many thanks for this ... I'll do some research

tanith

Please make sure you do get expert advice before you remove the tree or the hedge as it can cause all sort of problems to remove an established tree.. it might make a difference to the water table for a start and lead to 'heave' in the waterlogged soil...

pboae

Van1971 wrote: »

In that case I'd choose a shrub, possibly one with thorns to deter intruders, like Firethorn (Pyracantha Saphyr Orange), which is evergreen and has lovely white flowers in the spring and orange or red berries in the autumn.

Firethorn would be my choice as well, aside from being beautiful all year round, they are an *excellent* deterrent. (Though pruning them requires some careful forethought, it's a gloves and long sleeves job).

As tanith says though, you need to make sure this is done properly. You could do more harm than good if you just get them ripped out.

MimiJane

Thanks so much everyone for the excellent suggestions ... we're taking all of them on board and doing lots of research.

Shouldn't be a problem with taking everything out. The engineer's report advised us to have it all removed by professional tree surgeons, which we will be doing.

Keep 'em coming!

x

peter_the_piper

In addition to Firethorn you could consider Berberis, nice flowers, berries the birds like and vicious thorns. (I hate repotting these.) Depending on quantity it might be worth looking here http://www.shrubsdirect.com/shop/berberis.html?gclid=CImwo4DwgZECFQJaMAodNCNuAA
Nothing to do with me I might add.

susieb

I love ceonothus, this can be grown to form pretty hedge with blue flowers spring and summer, or escollonia also evergreen with pink flowers in the summer. These take a awhile to grow to the height you would like though.

chrissie55

or u cn have a mixed hedge - some good suggestions so far - we have privet, ceanothus (u need the evergreen type), St John's Wort (hypericum), cotoneaster, stranvaesia, yew, honeysuckle, buddleia, small-leaf h/suckle (lonicera nitida), assorted weedy roses, hebe, beauty berry (callicarpos), passionflower, mock-orange (philadelphus), ivy, periwinkle, cherry-laurel, pheasant-berry (leycesteria), euonymus, fuchsia, dog-rose + clematis on a trellis to hide the bins, so there's always something looking nice. Cor, didn't know we had so many till I listed em!