Narrow hedging

jedrzej88

Hello!

I would appreciate some advices on a hedging type for my driveway. 

At the moment I have a short brick wall on the nort-east boundary of my property and about 6m away from my house. There is a bit of sun in the morning but later it moves behind my property.

I removed a 50cm wide strip of pavement bricks inf front of that wall and hope to plant some shrubs that will grow to about 1.5-1.8m. It would be ideal if the fully grown hedging wouldn't be wider than 1m. Ideally evergreen or loosing foliage for a very short time and dense enough to stop prying eyes. Flowers would be lovely. 

Is thetr any shrub that would fit into my requirements? I dont mind frequent trimming. 

I have 3 thujas (probably?) that could be replanted but not sure of their suitability.

Thank you in advance.
Jed

amancalledgeorge

I would think how any plant would access water with block paving reaching so close to the planting area. Mind you, every time anyone mentions prying eyes...just consider that an impenetrable hedge creates more danger by not allowing any supervision of your property from the street so anyone could hide behind it and be up to no good. More eyes on a residential street equals more security as no opportunist thief would want to act in plain sight.

But anyway, if you want that hedge you'd better clear double the amount of ground so any plants you pick get access to rainwater. 

hogweed

I would suggest that you attach some decorative trellis to your brick wall (or independently) and grow a mixture of evergreen and deciduous climbers up it. Much easier to manage and will not encroach on your parking area. Dig out the majority of the soil there as it will have been compacted both by the wall footings and the drive blocks and replace with some enriched topsoil. 

Loxley

I would go with Pyracantha, can be trimmed flat to the wall. You could extend the height of it higher than the wall by training to posts and wires. Agree with Hogweed about the soil, break up and remove hardcore in the planting trench. 

You may find your paving starts coming apart with the edge of it left open. You should install an edging which needs to be concreted in - to allow space for your planting strip, you're probably going to need to remove another row of blocks.