Tanner points out that living fences can do more than just screen views or act as property boundaries. Hedges, vines, and espaliers can also act as partitions to enclose or divide gardens and sitting areas. A smaller living fence can hide an outdoor work space from the rest of the garden so that tools are stored out of sight. His book explores a variety of living fences as alternatives to expensive stockade fences, giving detailed explanations on selecting, planting, and propagating plants and shrubs. There is advice on selecting, pruning, and training species, detailing their advantages and disadvantages, ranges, and growing needs. Color photographs throughout. (Reviewed Apr. 1, 1995)1881527670George Cohen

Those looking for solitude‘or simply privacy‘in their gardens as well as beauty will find a host of choices in this comprehensive, accessible, sophisticated and fluidly written overview of the title's trio of naturally growing alternatives to fences. In the main chapters, Tanner (Gardening America) provides information on the three varieties of horticultural fences, following each with a generous listing of species suitable for specific tasks, e.g.,``windbreaks,'' ``espaliers for foliage and form,'' ``fast-growing vines.'' Thumbnail plant ``bios'' include such considerations as hardiness zones, available cultivars, planting procedures and care. Illustrated with lush photographs, the volume concludes with a list of resource nurseries and a bibliography. Gently reminding new yard- and garden-makers that hedges need be neither tall nor evergreen, Tanner offers much to experienced gardeners too: the section on espaliers‘one of gardening's more challenging specialties‘is itself worth the price of the book. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved