Hedgelaying pics

[Stubby]

52 minutes ago, Gimlet said:

All done.

A lot of this twisted stuff in it, and trees fused together. Result of flailing I reckon:

 

All down ready for binding:

 

And another job jobbed:

 

 

 

 

I hate the " war zone " that flails leave round here . They take away the berries that are winter feed for the wild birds .

[gary112]

10 minutes ago, Stubby said:

I hate the " war zone " that flails leave round here . They take away the berries that are winter feed for the wild birds .

They ruin hedges Stubby,they smash all the crap into the bottom of the hedge and smother anything from growing 

[Guest Gimlet]

23 minutes ago, Stubby said:

I hate the " war zone " that flails leave round here . They take away the berries that are winter feed for the wild birds .

Yep. At least don't flail before January/February so the birds have had a chance to eat the berries.

To be fair to the above client, they are heeding advise about flailing and that particular hedge was only cut so heavily because it is next to a busy entrance track and they needed to keep it back to maintain access. 

 

 

[harvey b davison]

All done.
A lot of this twisted stuff in it, and trees fused together. Result of flailing I reckon:

 
All down ready for binding:

 
And another job jobbed:

 

 

 
 

Some bloody good workmanship there [emoji106]

[nepia]

That's for sure.  In a couple of years that hedge will be habitat heaven as well as a darned good stock hedge.

[Guest Gimlet]

Thanks for the comments. This client is actually using them as stock hedges. They're planting new hedges all the time, with the intention of laying them all. I've probably done about a mile and a half so far. 

They've stopped renewing fencing on pasture where the hedges have been laid, only using temporary electric fences for the sheep at lambing time. They've got beef cattle grazing fields now with only laid hedges for stock barriers and they're containing them no problem. 

 

I wish I could get in on the hedge planting as well. Some of them are a bit iffy. They're none too straight for a start and the species distribution isn't very good. Most are a mix of 75% hawthorn with the rest made up of maple, wayfaring, guelder rose, crab apple, spindle and dogwood - which personally I'd like to leave out altogether because it's too invasive and a nuisance for future maintenance. 

Quite often there'll be 50 yards of solid hawthorn then a clump of six wayfarers, or six crab apples all together, which isn't right. Also, they have very few rabbits on the farm and I think they could do away with the tree guards. They're plastic spirals and crab apple particularly, hates them. They sweat inside the guards and get fungal infections. I've found loads of crab apples that were dead and full of rot and fungal growth where the tree guards had been round them. That last hedge didn't have a single crab apple in it but there were plenty of empty tree guards lying under the leaf litter. I bet those were due to crab apple mortality. And as they've been clump planted, that's left gaps.  

 

I'm trying to talk them into establishing their own coppice as well. They've got various tree belts that could easily be given over to hazel and managed as coppice.  

Edited November 8, 2020 by Gimlet

[gary112]

9 hours ago, Gimlet said:

Thanks for the comments. This client is actually using them as stock hedges. They're planting new hedges all the time, with the intention of laying them all. I've probably done about a mile and a half so far. 

They've stopped renewing fencing on pasture where the hedges have been laid, only using temporary electric fences for the sheep at lambing time. They've got beef cattle grazing fields now with only laid hedges for stock barriers and they're containing them no problem. 

 

I wish I could get in on the hedge planting as well. Some of them are a bit iffy. They're none too straight for a start and the species distribution isn't very good. Most are a mix of 75% hawthorn with the rest made up of maple, wayfaring, guelder rose, crab apple, spindle and dogwood - which personally I'd like to leave out altogether because it's too invasive and a nuisance for future maintenance. 

Quite often there'll be 50 yards of solid hawthorn then a clump of six wayfarers, or six crab apples all together, which isn't right. Also, they have very few rabbits on the farm and I think they could do away with the tree guards. They're plastic spirals and crab apple particularly, hates them. They sweat inside the guards and get fungal infections. I've found loads of crab apples that were dead and full of rot and fungal growth where the tree guards had been round them. That last hedge didn't have a single crab apple in it but there were plenty of empty tree guards lying under the leaf litter. I bet those were due to crab apple mortality. And as they've been clump planted, that's left gaps.  

 

I'm trying to talk them into establishing their own coppice as well. They've got various tree belts that could easily be given over to hazel and managed as coppice.  

That’s great that they don’t fence cos thats the whole idea why we lay hedges(to form a stock barrier)when my dad was laying back in the sixties he also dug a ditch as he went(by hand)

[AHPP]

Thanks for the comments. This client is actually using them as stock hedges. They're planting new hedges all the time, with the intention of laying them all. I've probably done about a mile and a half so far. 
They've stopped renewing fencing on pasture where the hedges have been laid, only using temporary electric fences for the sheep at lambing time. They've got beef cattle grazing fields now with only laid hedges for stock barriers and they're containing them no problem. 
 
I wish I could get in on the hedge planting as well. Some of them are a bit iffy. They're none too straight for a start and the species distribution isn't very good. Most are a mix of 75% hawthorn with the rest made up of maple, wayfaring, guelder rose, crab apple, spindle and dogwood - which personally I'd like to leave out altogether because it's too invasive and a nuisance for future maintenance. 
Quite often there'll be 50 yards of solid hawthorn then a clump of six wayfarers, or six crab apples all together, which isn't right. Also, they have very few rabbits on the farm and I think they could do away with the tree guards. They're plastic spirals and crab apple particularly, hates them. They sweat inside the guards and get fungal infections. I've found loads of crab apples that were dead and full of rot and fungal growth where the tree guards had been round them. That last hedge didn't have a single crab apple in it but there were plenty of empty tree guards lying under the leaf litter. I bet those were due to crab apple mortality. And as they've been clump planted, that's left gaps.  
 
I'm trying to talk them into establishing their own coppice as well. They've got various tree belts that could easily be given over to hazel and managed as coppice.  

What’s your ideal species mix, order, spacing etc for a functional stock-proof hedge?

[Guest Gimlet]

I'd say 60% hawthorn as your mainstay, 10-15% field maple and the rest made up of crab apple, wayfaring tree, guelder rose and hazel for biodiversity and to attract a range of insects and pollinators. Bird cherry is pretty good as well. That's what I'd use down here but it might vary depending on soil and location. Take note of which wild species are growing well locally. Your mainstay species doesn't want to be less than 50%. 60% is a good starting point with hawthorn.

As above, I don't like dogwood because it is too invasive and it won't get browsed off. Spindle is toxic to horses (so is field maple potentially, but as it's the seeds that are toxic, in practice field maple is a lot less hazardous than sycamore (which is an awful hedging species in any case). Buckthorn is not good near horses either, nor is privet or box - which don't belong in a wild native hedge anyway. I would avoid all willows too because they are to vigorous with too open a habit to make a good hedge. 

 

Some people don't like blackthorn near livestock in general and horses in particular because the length of the thorns can cause eye injuries. I'm not much of a fan of blackthorn in hedges regardless of livestock. It suckers too readily and it regrows in a way that doesn't suit a hedge. Rather than putting up new leaders around the pleach cut, it will send suckers up from the root network in a ring some distance from the leader that's been cut. So when you lay blackthorn you actually encourage the migration of sucker growth away from the hedge line and out into the field. And furthermore, once there's enough new suckers to sustain, the root is likely to transfer its energy to those at the expense of your pleacher so you can get a lot of dieback within the hedge. Hawthorn is king of the hedgerow species, blackthorn is a colonising scrub plant in my view. 

 

Unfortunately, if you buy proprietary hedging mixtures from nurseries, even if they're specified as livestock mixes, they will often include species you don't want like blackthorn, dogwood and spindle. Some even add elder for some bizarre reason. They're also very fond of slipping in briar and dog rose. They'll appear in a mature hedge anyway in due course because of bird distribution, but you don't want them when you're trying to get a hedge established for laying because they will out-compete your structural species and create holes. 

 

Planting density wants to be 12-13" between plants in a double offset row with 16-18" between rows giving 5-6 plants per metre. Minority species want to be distributed evenly among the mainstays so bundles are best broken up and mixed beforehand. 

Edited November 8, 2020 by Gimlet

[AHPP]

11 hours ago, Gimlet said:

I'd say 60% hawthorn as your mainstay, 10-15% field maple and the rest made up of crab apple, wayfaring tree, guelder rose and hazel for biodiversity and to attract a range of insects and pollinators. Bird cherry is pretty good as well. That's what I'd use down here but it might vary depending on soil and location. Take note of which wild species are growing well locally. Your mainstay species doesn't want to be less than 50%. 60% is a good starting point with hawthorn.

As above, I don't like dogwood because it is too invasive and it won't get browsed off. Spindle is toxic to horses (so is field maple potentially, but as it's the seeds that are toxic, in practice field maple is a lot less hazardous than sycamore (which is an awful hedging species in any case). Buckthorn is not good near horses either, nor is privet or box - which don't belong in a wild native hedge anyway. I would avoid all willows too because they are to vigorous with too open a habit to make a good hedge. 

 

Some people don't like blackthorn near livestock in general and horses in particular because the length of the thorns can cause eye injuries. I'm not much of a fan of blackthorn in hedges regardless of livestock. It suckers too readily and it regrows in a way that doesn't suit a hedge. Rather than putting up new leaders around the pleach cut, it will send suckers up from the root network in a ring some distance from the leader that's been cut. So when you lay blackthorn you actually encourage the migration of sucker growth away from the hedge line and out into the field. And furthermore, once there's enough new suckers to sustain, the root is likely to transfer its energy to those at the expense of your pleacher so you can get a lot of dieback within the hedge. Hawthorn is king of the hedgerow species, blackthorn is a colonising scrub plant in my view. 

 

Unfortunately, if you buy proprietary hedging mixtures from nurseries, even if they're specified as livestock mixes, they will often include species you don't want like blackthorn, dogwood and spindle. Some even add elder for some bizarre reason. They're also very fond of slipping in briar and dog rose. They'll appear in a mature hedge anyway in due course because of bird distribution, but you don't want them when you're trying to get a hedge established for laying because they will out-compete your structural species and create holes. 

 

Planting density wants to be 12-13" between plants in a double offset row with 16-18" between rows giving 5-6 plants per metre. Minority species want to be distributed evenly among the mainstays so bundles are best broken up and mixed beforehand. 

Thorough answer. Thank you very much.

Is the staggered/offset planting pattern to set you up for weaving it each side of stakes at the first laying?