Hi

We have a large gap of about 20ft in our mature established hedging
against the boundary fence between us and a neighbour, which we want to
plant with some screening as they overlook our back garden from higher
up a hill. The fence is the type that is concrete slabs at the bottom
with wooden panelling on top, to about 8ft high. There is a mature and
established holly hedge about 10ft or so high on our side but this
stops, at which point there is a kind of sparsely planted soil bed
continuing along which has the odd thing in it, a virginia creeper and a
buddleia amongst other things, none of which provide any real screening.
Next to the fence on the other side of the gap there are 2 or maybe even
3 sycamore trees which were pollarded a couple of years ago, and which
caused the overlooking situation. However being established mature
trees their roots are everywhere in the soil there and we discovered
that when we tried to plant a 3ft pembury blue conifer in part of the
gap that it was really hard work to plant anything there as it was a
real jungle of tough roots, and the conifer is obviously struggling as a
result. The fence is oriented north/south so the plants on our side
would face roughly west but with some shade but also shelter from the
fence and sycamores to begin with.

I have been racking my brains trying to think of some hedging that will
grow fairly fast, with a semi-evergreen screening effect, windy position
at times, the wind whips over the top of the fence and blows down the
hill across the garden. Ideally it would get to 12-15 ft. I am now
wondering about bamboo, as someone else has mentioned this, it can grow
fast, tall and semi-evergreen, hopefully won't have the same problem
with the roots but might spread where we don't want it to and of course
under the fence, plus it might not look in keeping with the rest of the
garden which is a mature woodland type with rhodies and conifers etc.
Are there any which would be easier to control but still thrive in the
situation and blend in?

I don't want to add trellising on top of the fence or anything like
that, it's too awkward a position, the fence is quite old - it would
look too obvious plonked on top and really wouldn't be high enough.

Also, is there any way we can help the pembury blue with its struggles,
I really don't want to lose it, it's full of brown patches and looks
fairly unwell - should we feed it, extra water or what?

Many thanks!
Lynda