Yes I have been short of time lately, but after I just saw your latest questions, I took only a moment to walk over to my row of trees and check thier measurements. The fence behind my trees appears 10 times worse that the one in your photo. My trees are planted on about 9 foot centers and I only did one row of them. The bottom four feet height on then averages spreads across their widths of at average is 5 feet all the way around them. For the distance from the two intercecting fences inside corner to the end of the bad fence my trees are distacting the view from is about 50 feet long. I have 7 GGs planted along this length. the GG's trunk nearest to the inside corner of the intercecting fences has a trunk only 4 feet away from the corner. the 6 other GGS have an 8 feet distance I can measure from trunk to trunk, But the planting holes when first dug were centered at almost 9 feet distances. The lower 4 feet of the trees are the most full and there is still an average of a 2 foot gap between each of the trees that needs to fill in before the trees will make a solid screen along that height of the 6 foot tall fence. Since I stoped giving my trees osmokote even before last year the rest of the trees growth is not as thick or wide, so there is even more view of the top two feet of the ugly fence. This is the reason why I suggested it is best for you to plant two staggered rows. That way you will have a better full screen more quickly than my trees. the neighbor's two story house is no more than 4 feet on the otherside of the ugly fence. The tops of my trees have grown about a foot higher than the bottom of their second story windows. I measured a 4 foot distance from the fence slats to the trunks of my trees, and I could still easily, with out much tree branch displacement, walk behind my trees and the fence when I came up with the 50 foot measurement for the lengh of fence that the lower 4 feet of this line of trees currently cover. One other note is that I planted only 18 inch tall trees to start. They are fairly well protected from the prevailing north/south winds because the 2 story house is directly south of them and there is a large scarlet oak tree directly north of the first 3 from that inside corner I discussed above. I live on a corner lot and my house faces west, but the fence in question is along along the east facing back yard/south side yard, and it stretchs westward to about half the depth of our south facing side yard. So my GGs get plenty of afternoon sun, especially in the summer and before they grew so tall got a lot of morning shade. I only went to all this description to illustrate how protected they are from drying winds. This is so effective for then that my trees have never taken on a bronzy cast that many people report their GGS do in the winter. My trees are also planted on a slight rise where the builders of the two story house so close south of my trees never did a good job cleaning out the builders sand they uses when installing a narrow sidewalk between that house and the privacy fence. The growth I reported with my trees has all been affected by theses issues I have just discussed. GGs which struggle will slow draining soil that stays wet longer will grow only half as fast as mine have until they get well established, which could take up to 4 years. Some of them might even die during sudden dry periods and have to be replaced. Also trees planted at 6 feet tall might take a full 2 years before you see much top growth out out them. That is because they will be using this time to develop a better root system which can support the 5 foot yearly growth these trees do while they are young and once they are established. The trade off you get with this is while they are waiting to develop a larger root system and not growing much in height, they will be doing a better job than mine did concerning the thickening of their trunks and also thickening the density and spread of their branches. My trees did not have to that root size catch up so they started showing nice top growth in the first year they were planted. It took them all this time though to develop an exceptionally good density and branch spread over the lower 4 feet of them. If I had kept spreading Osmokote under them and watering them regularly in dry periods after they got well established, them that exceptionally nice thickness and spread portion of them today might have reached at least 8 feet high. As it is they have a fairly nice appearance from top to bottom, but do not have the type of screening affect that you would want to handle well the issues you have described in your back yard view. Hope that with all this description, it will help you to understand better why I suggested a double staggered row with the front row beeing the Steeplechase trees. If cost is an issue, you might plant 6 foot tall GGS on the back row and either purchase locally or order in if they cannot be found locally the steeplechase sport cultivars of the GGS. If ordered in those Steeplechase cultivar trees would probably on be available no larger than 3 gallon size and will look fairly thin when you get them, but if you provide them good drainage, water them correctly, and feed them with osmokote each spring and fall growing season then it will suprise you a how quickly they catch up in size the the larger GGS you planted in the back row.

looks like normal winter color ....MAYBE some winter burn due to the transplant ... but hard to tell on that pic ... give them some more time. ... and proper water.. and nothing else ken

frank does mail order??? plant in later september ... plenty of time to find mail order ... insist on single leader trees ... or make them yourselves ... to save on mail order ... i would suggest.. in 3 years.... there will be no difference between a 2 to 4 footer... in other words.. a waste of money.. including extra shipping ... have a soil test done ..... NEVER FERT unless a soil test indicates something is missing..and never fert a stressed tree.. and a transplant will be stressed for two years ... i dont have a link to brandons planting guide on my laptop ... dave.. reality check ... you will get no privacy from a 2 to 3 foot plant.. so do it in the next proper planting season .... as per above ... we will need to know the soil type.. clay has special instructions ... for TWO YEARS... the ONLY important thing.. is PROPER WATERING ... spacing depends on how fast you want them to fill in ... give us some facts .... including how big the yard is .... my 4 inchers in 2000 are going on 15 to 20 feet tall.. and 8 to 10 feet wide ...ON MY 5 ACRES .... these arent for most suburban settings .... presuming you have other goals for your yard ... ken

Thanks for the input. Here are some more pics. The first to show the chain-link fence and what I'm trying to screen from. The second to show the other side of the property where I have a Woodfence that I want to add privacy trees in front of. You can also see that it's downward sloped and it gets a little wet. I checked out the juniper they do seem to be a little pricey. Since my place is fenced in would you suggest emerald green instead?