To get some ideas, try your library for gardening and design books, or magazines with pictures of shrub borders, and see if you can pin down what look you like, how much time you want to spend on planning and design, and how much time you want to spend on maintenance and waiting for the plants to reach a size that will screen out the neighbors. Most grasses won't get tall enough, I think, to block the windows of the house next door. A hedge of all one kind of plant is easy to plan and plant, and depending on whether it needs trimming or can be left natural, maintenance will vary. If you need privacy in summer only, you can use a deciduous shrub, and one that flowers will give you a bonus in spring or summer. A mixed planting is more interesting to look at, but requires more planning and thought, as well as more space. It will look best if there is a mix of large and small shrubs layered with the smaller in the front, and a mix of textures, meaning large leaves and small. Mixing evergreen and deciduous shrubs will add interest, as will including a few plants that are interesting in winter. Colorful berries, evergreen foliage, colorful bark, etc. It depends on how involved you want to get in designing a planting. If you take your time and put some thought into it, you could end up with something that is beautiful to look at while it gives you privacy. Tour a local nursery with a notebook and ask questions. Take notes about plants that will do well in your location, which appears to be at least partly shaded for part of the day. You might want to observe the site for how long it's sunny and how long it's shaded so you choose appropriately. 6 hours or more is considered full sun.

Gene, they are beautiful aren't they? Be vigilant in your search in the foliage for bagworms which did in several of mine so they needed replacing. Some years they are really bad other years they're gone. You can pull off the tiny twig 'bags' and stomp on them but the silk that attaches it to the arborvitae is tightly wound around the twig. If it's on an important branching area you can try to scissor it off other wise expect some later twig death and clip those parts off. Spraying to kill the eggs laid by the moth is probably the best preventative to prevent the larval damage that occurs before you even see a suspended bag on a twig.

HELP! Three weeks ago we bought a house in Zone 15 (Central Coast of California, "frost-free" area about 1/4 mile from ocean, no salt spray, wind-sheltered), tore out the raggedy old plantings and now face the street with no privacy! There's an live oak and a Giant Sequoia along our street frontage, so there's partial shade and the soil is acid. We need 2 or 3 types of fast-growing shrubs for privacy (allowed to grow naturally - we don't want a pruned, uniform hedge.) Need to reach 10 feet, if possible. Would any of these work for us? NEAR/UNDER THE OAK: purple hopseed bush (dodonea viscosa), bay laurel (laurus nobilis), mock orange (pittosporum tabira) or escallonia rubra. NEAR/UNDER THE REDWOOD: camellia, carpenteria, pittosporum tabira, laurus nobilia, rhododendron. Thanks!

I agree that solid privacy fence is probably the best option, even if he/she just does that one section of view. Another thought of mine was to plant a tree like swedish columnar aspen. My initial thought was that you can keep it narrow at the base and then let it grow wider near the top, but this probably wouldn't work, since near the bottom is where they want the privacy and these trees are somewhat just bare trunk near the bottom. Cedars wouldn't work as well, unless perhaps thuja occidentalis 'degroots spire' cedar but even then it would take a while to gain any height (not to mention expensive to try to make a hedge out of many of them, might as well buy a section of privacy fence). Maybe lattice and an aggressive yet dependable vine like virginia creeper? Dropmore honeysuckle? The only downside with any vine is that in early spring, late fall and winter there would be no leaves so poochie would be able to see through. Hard to believe he/she doesn't bark when he just hears the kids as opposed to seeing them. I'm no dog trainer but perhaps the owner has to get involved and start scolding him when he growls at the fence? Somehow make him understand the kids are not in his territory? I wonder if he's one of those dogs that's just left outside alone all the time, which can lead to behavior problems too. Anyways, I hope there's a solution as I can't imagine it's pleasant for the kids to be growled at in their own back yard, nor for the neighbors who probably listen to the dog barking. Glen