A flower garden can beautify your home and yard by adding color, and even by attracting wildlife such as hummingbirds, robins, and butterflies.  In addition, a garden can serve another purpose: to enhance the amount of privacy you enjoy in your yard or on your patio.

While it may seem strange to grow a garden just to keep the outside world from seeing in, this is the goal (sometimes a very long-term goal) of many gardeners.  By cultivating a wide variety of shrubs, flowering bushes, and other greenery you too can use you garden to enhance the privacy you enjoy on your property.

The first step in creating your privacy garden is to select what type of vegetation you want to use to screen your patio or yard.  Cedar or yew hedges are popular choices, but these types of hedges can block out too much light.  A good alternative is to choose several different types of shrubs and trees and stagger them throughout your yard.

This will filter the view from outside your yard and provide you with lots of light.  Good choices for this approach are lilacs, which grow quickly, evergreen shrubs, which provide year round foliage, or leafy trees that have low branches.  Another way to foster privacy is by planting many bushes that grow tall.  Good examples of these kinds of bushes include several species of rose bushes or butterfly bushes.

Be sure to include a chair or bench to sit on while enjoying your private oasis. Perhaps a garden fountain or waterfall would be a great part of your long term goals for your special privacy garden.

You can also use hanging plants with long, droopy flowers to create more privacy around patios.  Patio screens along with on the ground planters or raised planters can also be used to achieve privacy.  Another great option is to use arbors and trellises, or fences that allow climbing vines to flourish; these vines will require a minimum of care and attention while showing off pretty flowers while still providing year round privacy.