Many people plant privacy screens between themselves and their neighbors. Usually this is intended to mask an ugly view, or to provide a private area for the people themselves.

These privacy screens are a good idea, but they are often planted the easiest possible way. Most are simply a straight row of a single kind of plant ? all red-tip photinia or all burford holly for instance. Nature doesn?t do it that way for a very good reason. When just one kind of plant predominates, you have what?s called a "monoculture". In an unnatural monoculture not only do plants live shorter lives, but there?s nothing to take their place if a disease wipes them out. PLUS a monoculture is prone to wholesale eradication by a freak of nature like a hard freeze or a strange disease. Like Dutch Elm disease did in the midwest.

Instead, responsible landscape designers often advise people to plant a diversity of species. Maybe even a few trees, too. In this area, consider a mixture of East Palatka holly, Needlepoint holly, wax myrtle, dwarf burford holly, Nellie R. Stephens holly, Wilson?s holly, eastern red cedar and abelia.

I like to add a few (perhaps smallish) deciduous trees to a privacy screen to add visual interest. Like a soapberry, possumhaw holly, eve?s necklace or native plum.

If you have a fence already ? maybe even the old chain-link kind ? consider softening its appearance with a flowering vine. My favorite for this area is Crossvine (bignonea capreolata). Crossvine covers a fence quickly, but doesn?t spread aggressively to where it?s not wanted. It?s also evergreen. Passionvine and coral honeysuckle (both Texas natives) can work well, too. Vines to avoid are Japanese honeysuckle and most kinds of trumpet vine.

Simple fences are a good idea in some situations; they tend to be a psychological barrier, and they function as a supporting structure for plants. My favorite is a simple "split-rail" fence (which has minimal function unless you raise cows), coupled with a diversity of native, drought-tolerant plants.

All of the plants in a privacy screen need not be evergreen. (You probably don?t need a solid screen in the winter, anyway). A few evergreens, placed randomly among the privacy screen, will do the job. The rest can be deciduous ? leaves drop off in the winter. On average, mixed-plant privacy screens are about one-quarter deciduous plants. If they?re totally evergreen, it?s going to look the same 365 days of the year. That?s terribly boring!

Once the various plants are planted, resist the urge to keep them from growing to their natural heights. Too often, I see screening shrubs that grow (naturally) to a height of 5 or 6 feet. But they?re whacked off every week or two ? to the unnatural height of two or three feet! (A common example is burford holly, whose natural height is about 5 feet.) Plants hate over-pruning like this and are likely to die (over a period of several years) in protest.

Plants usually do better when we don?t fuss over them or try to force them to be something they?re not. In the case of privacy screens, the most effective ones are the natural ones. And the very best time of year to plant a screen starts right now ? through the end of November.