One thing to consider when planting roses and trees is that the trees roots are mega space and water hogs. Over time to the detriment of your roses. In the competition for water your roses will lose from what I understand.

You don't have a picture by chance do you? I was going to say that years ago when we moved into our house I put an inexpensive trellis up on one side of our porch. On that I now grow Virginia Creeper. That way my husband can sit out there and read, smoke, sip an adult beverage without being viewed by everyone who drives and walks by. Depending on your layout perhaps that is one option for you also.

My other thought for you was to maybe erect a couple of sets of 4 x 4's with nice but simple trellis's inbetween them. On that you could grow roses and maybe skip the trees. Depending on your situation of course.

Hope this helps.

Kate

THanks Kate....My daughter has my digital cam at the moment, I will post pics tomorrow. I have lattice on one side, but really can't put it up where I need it....that is where we walk out into the yard. The pics would be very helpful I'm sure. I did think about a tall trellis perhaps but our porch sits up sort of high and not sure it would screen as much as I'd like. We like adult beverages and adult BBQ's but we live next door to an ultra conservative pentecostal minister (who is extremely nice). But..out of respect, we'd rather have some privacy! And, I'm quite certain he would too! LOL

Morning Glories grow fast adn tall, and readily self-seed. That might be a better answer than trees and roses, especially since any tree takes so long to establish.

There are also plants like a Climbing Shell Plant That gets big and tall and is really cool looking, along with hvaing a reputed great fragrance and long bloom season.

Make your own trellis, then you can go as high as you want. You could sink some 4x4's and hang a cattle panel on end between them. Do a series and you have insto-screen, just waiting for the climbing plant of your choise!

Trees will take a long time to block out your neibor view. Even a evergreen shrub like privet will take a few years. So your best bet is the vine and plant a hedge behind it to grow up with time. Unfortunatly most everygreen vines will have to be watch to keep in control. You only other choise is the ones that loose their leaves every winter and I do not think you want that, as you would see your neibors again for 3 to 4 months.

If you do the vine you can still have roses in front of it or you could use a climbing rose. There again it will go dormant during the winter months. Just make sure to research real good before planting many plants are invasive here in Tn. Check with the TN forum before you plant anything. Many there are up on that invasive list.

Good luck.

I have a wall of arborvitae on both sides of my property. They stay relatively thin and look neat. The roots don't seem to be a problem. But, if you buy taller ones to create an instant fence, it will be expensive. Smaller ones will take 5 years.

How much space is there? What is the exposure (north, south..etc). What is the drainage like? What would bother your neighbors? You don't want to bother your neighbors.

One of the smartest things I ever did was to not put any screen between a neighbor's window and mine. The neighbor put up a screen of foliage, and the neighbor must maintain it. So I got all the benefit of the screening, and none of the work!

As to color, the darker the green, the better the rose stands out against it.

Forget the Norway spruce idea. Beautiful tree--grows to about 80 ft tall and 30 ft wide, however! I had to take mine out when it started attacking the corner of the house. I still miss that tree, but . . . .

I vote for the decorative trellis with climbing roses and clematis growing on it.

Kate

Maybe this picture will help. Since the porch is elevated off the ground (about 3 ft), a trellis would have to be REALLY tall to work. The area faces north and there is about 50 feet from the bottom of my porch to the property line.

I just REALLY dont like this view! I'd much rather be sing something else. Thanks again....you all have been so kind.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:257516}}

So just to clarify this is what you see from YOUR house correct? This is your view, not theirs?

I'm starting to think that with the amount of space you have perhaps you could mix trees that are very upright growing. Like Aspens maybe. Mix tall, narrow-ish angular trees in with the trellis's and break up the view that way without putting a fence in that just completely divides you from your neighbors. Hope that makes sense. Even tall bushes in between sets of trellis would be nice like lilacs, snowball bush or maybe mix white and red quince. Enough to create a visual barrier but not alienate you from the neighbors.

Kate

Exposure is pretty important as you're going to have to plan your light for the trees, shrubs and plants. IMHO, a row of the same plant over the long distance of that property boundary is boring. I did it in my garden with arbor vitae which make a decent green backdrop for the border in front of them, but I wish I'd taken more time and thought to create groupings of trees and plants that were more interesting over more seasons. Think of an evergreen grouping (3-5 plants of differing heights, colors and shapes) that will be sited to provide privacy and interest at the most significant points, blocking the view of the cars and entrance to the house from the back sunporch. Then imagine interspersing colorful, architecturally interesting deciduous trees and flowering shrubs, again not in a straight line, but in natural curves that lead the eye to imagine more depth. Then build your border in front - you could put species roses, once-bloomers, climbers in the back of the border, medium-sized roses in front, interplant with perennials if you want. It could be really lovely, very interesting and appealing over multiple seasons. Good luck. Let us see pictures when you plant!

Sue

50 feet! Wow, you have plenty of room to work with. So, if you were to plant a hedge, what would be shaded? Your property or the neighbors? That's important. Best not to plant anything too tall, just tall enough to make the neighbor's house disappear.

While a uniform hedge along the property line might look boring, if you plant a lot of roses in front of it, you don't notice the uniform hedge at all--it becomes background. And uniform background looks good with interesting roses in front of it. I have a line of Carolina Laurel Cherry (Prunus caroliniana) with roses in front of that to screen out the neighbor's house. Check with a good garden center for something that grows dense in your area but not too tall. Just a good basic landscape shrub.

Uniform background with roses in front:
{{gwi:257518}}

Faces north, that means the shade falls on the neighbor's property...which means your side will be nice and sunny for roses. :^)

OK here is what will grow fast. Try giant green arborvitae it gets 50' tall and 15 wide. Grows a 2 feet or more a year and you can buy them at lowes and home depot in good sizes. These are evergreen and low maintance i.e. no trimming needed unless you want too.

I have the emerald green arbovitae on the corners of my house for a wind break. This one gets 15'tall and 4'wide and grows a bit slower.

Your best bet is check with the local garden canters and nuseries. See what they suggest but I bet it will be one of the arbovitaes since they grow fast. There are a few differnt types and all grow to different heights.

I have a tendency to agree with harry shoe on this one. Arborvitae might be a good choice for a screening but be careful which variety you get or even which individual plant you get. Some arborvitae have a single leading trunk while other have multi-leading trunks. The ones with the multi-leading trunk will have a tendency to split and part of them begin to bend over, making the plants ugly. My Husband used to bind them together with bungy-cords to keep them looking uniform. I think when we moved, we left a dozen or so bungy-cords behind. Leyland Cypress might be a good choice and will tolerate prunning. But they are also a larger plant. Arborvitae is a narrow tree with a narrow root system and the right tree would be less work.

I like the idea of the cherry laural too, but that would be more work to keep them in line, especially if you have a narrow space.

I'll chime in on the vote for arbobitae. I have 3 planted around my deck that I've had to cut back because they have gotten so huge. They grow fairly quickly. Spruce is not a good choice because they grow VERY slowly. We have a double-line windbreak planted here that have been in the ground for 16 years and are only now beginning to get as large as what you will need. They are planted in front of my neighbors double line of scotch pines, though, so it wasn't an issue for us to have them grow fast. The neighbor's pines will likely die before our spruces and we'll still have a nice privacy screen for us both to enjoy.

The arborvitae is what I need for fast growth, but I do not intend to use it to line the entire property just perhaps 3 or 5 along that line where we can see the neighbors house. Eventually, we plan to extend the porch to the BACK of the house overlooking our back yard which is 1/2 acre.....and a much better view!

hoovb...that pic is lovely! I will look into the Carolina Laurel Cherry as well. I am not familiar with that tree in this area. Is it a fast grower as well? I have 1/2 acre to "fence" with trees and shrubs and do want to use a variety but my porch view is my "project red status" at the moment.

You all have been so kind in answering my question...thank so much!

ps...yes Kate...that is the view from MY side porch of the neighbors house. Just wanted to illustrate what I see.

Msjacki,
Crape Myrtle.
Grows really fast. A nice big one won't cost you alot of money. Blooms are gorgeous, leafs out early, my crape is already fully leafed here in PA, and when you eventually use the back yard for your BBQ's, you will still love seeing your crape myrtle bloom in the summer from the side porch.
Good Luck!

Could I just expand on what Hoov touched on? Be careful of permanent plantings that might impact your neighbors yard and consider what increased shade may do to their property/lawn, as well as fallen deciduous leaves, needle drop, roots. There's a saying, 'good neighbors don't plant trees' :) I'm not saying don't plant, I'm suggesting for anything that would grow large quickly, be thoughtful and do your research - removal of a problem large tree or even arborvitae would be expensive and there's the possibility hard feelings could grow with the shrub.

I admit I may be overly sensitive about this, but I had a new non gardening neighbor plop in a Home Depot fast growing to 60x40 acer rubrum in a 20' side yard, just 12 feet from my house. I asked her to move it and explained why, she didn't get it and was totally offended, we never did become friends.

Exactly what morz8 said, be thoughtful in what you plant so that you don't create friction with the neighbors. I choose moderate shrubs with well behaved root sytems, not huge trees. Just enough to block the view of the neighbors without having much impact on their property. It's the smart thing to do.

I have no idea how Carolina Laurel Cherry will do in your zone. I just used that as an example because I have that here. It is evergreen, drought tolerant once established, doesn't need much or any trimming, doesn't have an agressive root system, gets just tall enough to screen out the neighbor's house but so big as to turn the neighbor's yard into a gloomy dark mess, etc. Look at the basic shrubs that thrive and do the same thing in your area...

house but so big as to turn the neighbor's yard into a gloomy dark mess, etc

correction, make that "but not so big as to..."

sorry!