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A Gardener's Notebook: The latest incarnation of my column detailing the trails and tribulations of my garden. Join the list and ask your own questions about gardening Subscribe

As homeowners we are constantly dealing with boundaries. This is especially true if we are also gardeners. How do we keep the ivy from encroaching on the garage? How to keep the wisteria on its trellis? How to keep the grass out of our planting beds? Sometimes, though, the most contentious boundaries are those with our neighbors. We often want to beautify the stark wood, chain link or cement block walls that surround our property, but we always need to consider the wishes, plans and pocketbooks of those who shares these boundaries with us.

Good Neighbors

First, let me say that I have been blessed with some of the nicest neighbors possible. Since the previous owners of our house were avid gardeners the neighbors were already well aware of the gardening "goings-on" in our yard. They have shown the willingness to deal with the existing property line plantings. There are trees that over arch their lawns and houses as well as vines that sometimes poke through the fence looking for the sun.

They sometimes ask for trees to be trimmed, especially those that border our driveway. This neighbor doesn't like the tree branches scraping against his house, especially when our Santa Ana winds blow through. Since he is older he also doesn't like the extra work caused by the dropping leaves. He has asked me to "top" the trees on occasion, but I haven't gone that far. These particular trees were pretty badly abused in previous pruning and "topping" them would only cause more damage. His request has got me thinking about removing the trees entirely and replacing them with some sort of low growing shrub. This would be easier to maintain, have less of a chance of damaging the property line fence and also keep my cars from being buried in leaves, as they often are.

Habits

It is always important to remember the growing habits of various plants before adding them near a property line. Your neighbor might not appreciate a thorny and capacious bougainvillea tumbling over his fence and into his yard. I have some aggressive trumpet vines that were planted by the previous owners. While I love their striking red flowers the vines themselves are so strong that they have been know to pop the slats right off the aging wooden fence they lean on. Despite the installation of a free standing trellis they still want to cling to the fence since that is were the light is strongest. Each year I come closer and closer to removing these vines entirely before they can do any more damage.

Another problem that can arise with your property line plantings is an overzealous neighbor with good pruners. Can your plant survive your neighbor removing all growth that encroaches on their property line? Often neighbors, especially those only slightly familiar with gardening, will cut back a plant so severely that it may not recover. If you are unsure how your neighbor might react to a new addition, make sure the plant can survive losing a major portion of its growth.

The best avenue when planning your property line plantings, though, is talking to your neighbors. Robert Frost said "good fences make good neighbors", but so can smart garden planning and planting.