Forum home› Plants
This Forum will close on Wednesday 27 March, 2024. Please refer to the announcement on the Discussions page for further detail.

Laurel hedge problem

James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
in Plants
hi,

ive came here looking for some help with a newly planted laurel hedge.

i bought 30 9cm potted laurel plants to form a hedge around my garden.

they came with a single stem around 30cm long.

i dug in loads of good quality topsoil and planted them around 1 every 60cm. 

I then topped them all to around 20cm to encourage branching.

i noticed the leaves starting to crinckle and fold I'm not sure what's wrong. I could really use advice on what to do to make sure I get a hedge as fast as possible.

thanks 

Posts

  • K67K67 Posts: 2,506
    There is a thread about laurel hedges on here than runs into 17 pages maybe in amongst there is an answer for you. The leaves look nibbled are rabbits a problem where you are? 
    Laurels are tough they are sure to recover, just make sure they are firmly planted as the new soil you added might have settled.  Did you water thoroughll in this dry weather at least once or twice a week.
  • James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
    Yeah I've read that post all the way through that's what made me join this forum to ask. I posted a new thread as I don't want to hijack someone else's.
    i have never seen a rabbit nearby in my life so I don't think we have rabbits or any wild life of the sort for that matter. I do have a lot of snails, slugs and caterpillars though. 

    Ive watered over the last few weeks just wasn't sure what the crinkled looking leaves meant 
  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700
    The photos are a bit too close. But I don't think you should worry too much at this stage. They are very young plants and right now, the weather is warm. You must water them well in the evenings if no rain for over a week. Water well into the root area and feed the soil around the base. In the heat, the plants want to grow. The crinkling may iron out as the leaves expand and grow larger. I think, leave the plants as they are and concentrate on watering and feeding the soil with something like Fish Blood and Bone.
  • James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
    I'm adding some blood fish and bone tomorrow and I'll add bark clippings to the top of the soil. 

    I am a bit concerned as to how long it will take me to get a hedge as my plants are tiny compared to the plants you started with. 

    At the moment they are about 30cm tall with one single shoot. And they came in only 9cm pots filled with roots. 

    I was hoping to have a 6ft hedge within 2 years but that's not looking likely 
  • Kate.harriKate.harri Posts: 44
    Next door to me has a new Laurel hedge 2017, it seems to be growing quite fast.
  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700
    James.buttler1975, without seeing a photograph, it's difficult to advise you. But it certainly sounds like they need to be cut down a bit to produce some side shoots, which normally helps to thicken your shrubs. Your original photograph is too close to get an idea of what is actually their size and shape.
  • James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
    edited June 2018
    Here's a picture of them further away.

    they are very small unfortunately. I read that if you buy big plants you have to chop them down anyway so I went with small ones, hope doing this hasn't slowed down the time it takes to get a hedge 
  • James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
    The grass looks close but its actually 30cm away. I don't want a thick hedge I plan to make it as thin as possible (no more than 30cm) my garden is quite small and I don't want to take too much space away from the actual garden for the hedge. 
  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700
    James.buttler1975, I think you will struggle to keep this sort of shrub narrow. The problem may arise later, but you seem to have planted them too close to the fence and leaving them no room to expand outwards, and they will grow outwards aswell as upwards. The roots need to establish and eventually, they may break your fence due to their need to grow. I estimate that the narrowest width for this shrub would be 60cms, and that would require a lot of controlling in the next few years.

    Yes, they will need to be trimmed down by half their height, but do re-think about the type of hedge you want. I think this hedge will not be suitable for what you need.
  • James.buttler1975James.buttler1975 Posts: 14
    60cm would be ok I can easily trim it twice a year. Don't really have much option but to plant close to the fence. I read that it would be fine although the hedge will have no leaves on it on the side nearest the fence since no light will get to it. I read that it could be kept any thickness depending on how often you trim it maybe that was misleading information but unfortunately there's not really any other hedge I'd want in the garden so I'll have to just let it go and see how it turns out.

    ive already trimmed them to half their hieght on those photos 
Sign In or Register to comment.