As a rule, a garden can be protected from prying eyes with an ordinary privacy hedge made of cherry laurel or flowering shrubs. In gardens on slopes or next to high-rise buildings, trees may also be necessary as a high level of privacy to ensure privacy.
Which trees are suitable as privacy screens in the garden?
Trees as privacy screens offer privacy and shade in the garden. Suitable tree varieties include maple, ash, spruce, beech, willow and poplar. Depending on the location and the desired level of visibility in winter, deciduous trees or conifers are recommended. Pruning should be carried out professionally.
Keep distances for legal and practical reasons
Planting strong-growing tree varieties undoubtedly requires far more thoughtful planning than designing a flower bed or a low shrub hedge. Finally, trees can quickly reach sizes and heights that can sometimes make changes and maintenance very complex or expensive. So ask yourself in advance how close you can and should move the trees you want to plant to the property line. After all, not only the height of the trees themselves, but also the shadows they cause can become a problem for neighbors over the years. In addition, it is not uncommon for trees that have shot up to have to be laboriously removed after several years in order to avoid posing the sword of Damocles to your roof structure in the event of gusts of wind.
Choose the right type of tree
When looking for the right type of tree as a privacy screen, the basic question that needs to be clarified is whether the desired privacy should and must also be provided in winter. As deciduous trees such as maple, beech, willow and poplar, they lose their leaves in winter, so only the trunk and branches can provide a certain level of privacy. However, things are different with pines, spruces and firs, which as conifers can provide the desired privacy protection in the garden almost unchanged even in winter. However, other factors such as the usual habitus of the respective tree variety also need to be taken into account. Although poplars are generally considered to grow very quickly, their growth remains relatively narrow. With poplars as a privacy screen, relatively dense planting in the form of a hedge would be necessary. A maple tree forms a broader tree crown, but it hardly branches in the lower trunk area. If the green privacy screen is to form a green wall all the way down to the ground, it is advisable to plant spruce trees. However, as they get older, these may no longer be cut out in the lower area, as it will then be very difficult for them to form new branches at the base.
Rapid growth is possible for trees
Trees are often used as a high level of privacy protection, not least because they are usually comparatively inexpensive and sometimes produce astonishing growth of several meters per year. Under the right location conditions, the following tree varieties, among others, grow particularly quickly and reliably:
- Maple
- Ash
- Spruce
- Beech
- Willow
- Poplar
Cautionary pruning: professional tree care creates safety
In particularly exposed locations and with certain types of trees, improper pruning can sometimes destabilize the tree crown against attacking gusts of wind. Therefore, particularly stately specimens should be pruned by a professional arborist, especially if they are trees on busy streets or next to buildings.
Tip
Trees can not only act as a particularly high hedge at the property border, but can also define or block certain visual axes in the garden when planted as a solitary plant. A cleverly positioned tree with a stately crown can also shield views from high neighboring balconies onto a terrace or lawn.
