The area around my house is pretty open. I'd like to gain some privacy without a fence. Any ideas of something that stays green through the winter and grows rather quickly. I was thinking of bamboo but hear horror stories of it taking over. Any advice???

Arborvitae

cool link. lots of info.

Holly works real well

Bamboo works well. It certainly worked well at my dad's place. You can simply mow off the shoots.

If you have neighbors close by, you could isolate it by burying some kind of a barrier on that side. The root system lies pretty close to the surface, and it can be controlled.

Full size Barberry. Plum, golden should stay thick in your area. thorns so no sqeezin thru

Leland cyperss (SP). Plant them as 2ft tall trees,in 5 years they will be 15' tall. dark green evergreen tree,need's no mant. and no treming.. They make a good wind and noise break.

If you go with the cyprus, (which are awesome BTW, fast growing, attractive, excellent screening), make sure your soil has very good drainage.  They don't do too well in poor drainage areas or shallow clay layers.

Red-Tipped Photinia.

Quoted: Leland cyperss (SP). Plant them as 2ft tall trees,in 5 years they will be 15' tall. dark green evergreen tree,need's no mant. and no treming.. They make a good wind and noise break.

+1. A friend of mine needed a privacy screen and he planted some of these. They grow very quickly and are green year round. I think it is spelled Leyland Cypress though.


ETA: More info. at www.arborday.org/trees/treeGuide/TreeDetail.cfm?ID=126

Quoted: Bamboo works well. It certainly worked well at my dad's place. You can simply mow off the shoots. If you have neighbors close by, you could isolate it by burying some kind of a barrier on that side. The root system lies pretty close to the surface, and it can be controlled.

DO NOT PLANT BAMBOO!!!!

Bamboo can not be controlled like the people selling bamboo will tell you.  Bamboo is an invasive weed.

It will spread and attempt to take over the entire area.

If you left it alone for 2 weeks and had some amount of rain, you'd not be able to mow it very well.

One of my parent's rental houses had it, and it was a mess.

Never, ever, use bamboo in open planting.

Assuming your yard is always properly mowed, the bamboo will spread just below the surface to other neighbors' yards, etc.  The root structure will always be present until such time as large areas are completely excavated and the bamboo root ball{s} are removed.

Barriers are only marginally effective at containment, since most bamboo can exploit even the smallest crevice to continue it's movement.

DO NOT PLANT BAMBOO!!!!

Leland cypress is good, relatively inexpensive.
Italian cypress works good too, but stays a little thinner than the leland, more expensive.

I have both.