"Mike Lyle" wrote in message
...
Alex Woodward wrote:
"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
[...]
The wall is approximately 3 metres high by 4 mtrs long. It was
constructed about 8 years ago as part of a house extension. There
are
no windows [...]

I suggest that you ignore
the nonsense about ivy - it won't damage any walls built in the
past
50 years in the UK, unless they are already failing. It very
rarely
damages even older ones.

I take your point about ivy, but what about the mess it might leave
if after I plant it, if I later decide to remove it?. As I have
mentioned, the wall is part of a relatively new house extension and
I
certainly don't want to discolour the brick work for no good reason
(even though it does look a bit drab at the moment)


The point is that REMOVING ivy from a wall with loose mortar (e.g.
decaying lime mortar, as used over 50 years back) can cause
trouble,
but otherwise it does no more harm than any other evergreen
creeper.
And, to grow anything else, you need to fix a fairly solid
trellis,
which assumes that your mortar is solid!

The mortar is solid, plus there are other places where I can anchor
it.


That being said, I don't grow ivy. [...]

Hopefully it will grow quite rapidly initially, though I don't want
it to swamp the house. I don't mind if it completely covers the
wall
I intend putting it against though. Also I'd like to see some
colour
change on its leaves during autumn.

By the way I'd like to point out that I am not an avid gardener by
any means [...]

OK, no windows is good news with ivy. But if you aren't an avid
gardener, can you promise yourself that you will never let the ivy
get as far as the barge-boards or the roof? It can loosen slates and
prise apart the joints in woodwork.

I don't mind pruning now and again. Assuming they thrive, how often do they
need pruning. Do they grow as quickly as hedge rows for example?


If the wall were rendered and painted, removing ivy would leave
zillions of little "roots" and dead bits of stem behind: these would
show through the next coat of paint unless you laboriously scraped
them off. (I speak as an ivy-lover who has made the mistake.) On your
plain brick wall, these left-behind bits won't matter much, as
they'll eventually rot away

The wall is plain brick.
..

Some ivies colour nicely in the autumn, and stay that way all winter;
but it doesn't usually happen till they're mature, and may not happen
at all if they're well fed (one beauty I selected carefully in the
wild still wasn't colouring up ten years later).

In that case, is it better not to feed them so well after they have fully
grown or are there serious disadvantages in going down that route?

Alex