Laying 42m Of Hedge - That I Planted 9 Years Ago!

 The week before last I decided to finally lay the hedge I'd been thinking about for the last few years.

What's really good about laying this hedge is I planted it myself 9 years ago (read the blog post here). 

Learning Hedge Laying

 Last week I had a couple of perfect winter days. 

I do some work for a friend on a casual basis as he has a number of properties and they all need things doing to them on occasion (sash cords, floors, kitchens, etc), and he has a man who does much of the outside maintenance work on the estate. 

His name is Steve and he works on lots of farms and small holdings locally, he does some great work and one that always stands out is his hedge laying. I always chat to him if we're working on the estate at the same time, he's a smallholder as well so we share similar interests. 

Lawn Edging From Logs - Part 2

 So after my first posts about the lawn edging I then needed to peg them in place and fill the bed with compost.

To do this I used some of the cleft sweet chestnut I had left from building my rose arch. Putting a point on with a side axe is a job that only takes a few seconds. 

The Mixed Hedge Year 2

The hedge that we planted last March is looking really good!

Looking over the whole hedge I think out of the 500 or so trees we planted that only about 3 have died! A result I'm really pleased with. 

The 14 damson, plum and bullace trees we planted are also growing strongly. Most have little fruitlets on already, although I'm not sure how many will make it to my belly! 

I'm looking forward to watching this grow over the years. Be a while until I have to lay it though. 

Over 500 Trees Planted!

I'm so pleased with the last week - we have a new fence and hedge in! Woop! 

We did this years ago with the first field nearest the house, to separate off the footpath from the field and make things more private. We kept thinking about doing this with the second field as well, but it was during lockdown and seeing how few people kept their dogs on leads and could control them that made us decide that this was the right thing to do. 

Buds Are Breaking

Everything seems really far ahead this year - except me!

I've hardly started in the garden and I'm already about two weeks behind!

On the bright side my hawthorn hedge seems to be coming to life. All the buds are breaking on these trees that little bit earlier due to their "mini greenhouse" rabbit guards.

Is everyone else already playing catch up with the season or is it just me? I plan to plant a lot of seeds over the next week or so!