Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

 

The people who built, owned, and lived in our house, for the first ten years of its life, made an agreement with the neighbours to build a fence. It was right on the property line. Then the neighbor planted a cedar hedge on his side of the fence. A few years after we moved in, the fence was rotted and came down. After the cedar hedge filled in, it made a higher and nicer fence. We planted a boxwood hedge to fill in the open gaps at the bottom of the cedar hedge and it was like that until a few weeks go.

We have new neighbours and they have their own ideas. One day he started hacking down the cedar hedge. After he had done substantial damage, he stopped when he realised the hedge might not be his. He discovered it was and soon the cedars were down and gone. That left a little boxwood hedge for privacy.

About a month later, this fence went up. It is right on the property line and in the process of lining it up, he dug up and moved our boxwoods six inches further onto our property to make room for his fence. He told me I could do what I wanted with my side of the fence.

So, I did. I stained it with some pricey Benjamin Moore stain on Saturday and it looks great. The new richness of the wood is preserved as opposed to letting it weather before it is preserved, which is something he will probably do because he is a young dad who is busy.

 

 

The fence is too low for my liking, but it is a solid barrier. Our garden is now surrounded by fence and I suppose the critters will no longer use it as a thoroughfare.

 

The photos are all the same fence, but the stain shows more red in the shade, and yellow/gold in the sunshine. It feels great to get that done before the wet winter takes over. It then would have waited until spring and the fence would have lost its newness by then.