Hedgelaying... rates, costs, profit?

[Daniël Bos]

wow very impressed......

 

you guys need to stick your rates up, its seems a lot of work and with such a excellent finished product for such a low price????

 

or does it not take that long????

 

 

Say I charge £10/m, cost about £3/m. Average day does 18m

18 x £7 =£126 for every day associated with the job so that includes pricing time, paperwork time cake time etc. I'm self employed and make sure to earn little enough not to have to pay income tax (get some more tools by year's end if I get close) so that £126 is all mine and all profit.

 

Would you like me to teach you Adam?

[Hedge Chopper]

wow very impressed......

 

you guys need to stick your rates up, its seems a lot of work and with such a excellent finished product for such a low price????

 

or does it not take that long????

 

:biggrin:It is hard work but like everything there's only so much you can charge.Most of my work comes from environmental schemes on farmland where Natural England pay a contribution towards it otherwise the landowners and farmers wouldn't have it done.

 

The hard bit is finding work to do for the rest of the year,hedgelaying is only done between October and March.

[Adam Bourne]

Say I charge £10/m, cost about £3/m. Average day does 18m

18 x £7 =£126 for every day associated with the job so that includes pricing time, paperwork time cake time etc. I'm self employed and make sure to earn little enough not to have to pay income tax (get some more tools by year's end if I get close) so that £126 is all mine and all profit.

 

Would you like me to teach you Adam?

 

 

hehe would love and cone to watch you for a couple of hours one day Daniel, maybe give me a insight on how you do it ....but i love my climbing and it pays more....

 

you can do my hedges when i get asked to mate ....

[Adam Bourne]

:biggrin:It is hard work but like everything there's only so much you can charge.Most of my work comes from environmental schemes on farmland where Natural England pay a contribution towards it otherwise the landowners and farmers wouldn't have it done.

 

The hard bit is finding work to do for the rest of the year,hedgelaying is only done between October and March.

 

 

are yeah i forgot it was seasonal....

 

what you guys do then when your not laying....

 

i know Rover eats cakes.....

[Hedge Chopper]

are yeah i forgot it was seasonal....

 

what you guys do then when your not laying....

 

i know Rover eats cakes.....

 

I try and eat a fair bit of cake too

 

The rest of the time its mostly work like fencing and subbing out to a mate who's a dredging and drainage contractor.Also go back on the land a bit now and then as I've got a lot of experience on big farming kit.

[roseyweb]

My misses wants me to lay the hedges up her stables, I have a rough Idea of what to do, what is the importance of the stakes and binders, as to be honest I want to do it as cheaply and quickly as possible

[Hedge Chopper]

My misses wants me to lay the hedges up her stables, I have a rough Idea of what to do, what is the importance of the stakes and binders, as to be honest I want to do it as cheaply and quickly as possible

 

Stakes hold the hedge in place when you have laid it,you don't really need the binders on the top as some styles don't have them but I cut the midland style which traditionally had the binders on the top to stop cattle pulling the laid hedge apart with their horns.

[Graham]

With horses in the field you'll need to leave plenty of brash on the side facing them or they'll be nibbling all the bark off.

[mattplace]

My misses wants me to lay the hedges up her stables, I have a rough Idea of what to do, what is the importance of the stakes and binders, as to be honest I want to do it as cheaply and quickly as possible

 

Same here! My misses asked what i could do with a 80m (approx) length of overgrown hawthorn hedge approx 20ft high (iirc ) up her stables. I stupidly said it could be layed! Now thats on my 'to-do' list!

Having never done it before, are there any tips? i will get some pics later today and have a good look at the different species. i know there is some young oak growing amongst it too. Would you lay it too?

[Hedge Chopper]

Same here! My misses asked what i could do with a 80m (approx) length of overgrown hawthorn hedge approx 20ft high (iirc ) up her stables. I stupidly said it could be layed! Now thats on my 'to-do' list!

Having never done it before, are there any tips? i will get some pics later today and have a good look at the different species. i know there is some young oak growing amongst it too. Would you lay it too?

 

I've done big stuff like that before,you have to be a bit careful as the older and bigger it is the drier and less flexible it becomes and this means its much easier to snap it off.

 

You need to leave plenty on the hinge too as the bigger the stem the more sap it needs to keep it going.

 

Di this one last year which was not originally part of the job but they didn't know what to do with it.it was choked with ivy and most of the stems were 8-10 inches wide and it was 20 feet tall.not the easiest job I've ever done!