I would really like to plant a silver birch by the boundary fence with
my nextdoor neighbour, and surround it with an hedge. The tree would
have been planted just over 7 metres from the house. BUT after
reading the recent thread about sliver birch and taking into account
that my neighbour said that he knew of someone who experienced
problems with the expanding roots of one of these trees, would it be
wise to scrap the idea altogether? Are there any varieties of silver
birch where the root system is less attrusive? Also, if the news on
this is bad as I suspect it will be, what kind of trees are generally
safe to plant in a back garden? An alternative I was thinking about
was a mountain ash. Any info would be much appreciated.

Cheers,

Manic Blue