You haven't cut them back by half ... I'm sorry but .......... what's the point of coming back and asking what to do if you don't follow the advice that we've all given?
Grasp the nettle, take the bull by the horns, bite the bullet ...........
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
There have been numerous threads over the years on how to get the best laurel hedge and the answer is always the same correct one as given here. People find it difficult to prune as hard as is necessary but it is the best course of action. There is an old saying which applies here - growth follows the knife.
One way to think about it is you have paid for good strong roots and you are making their life difficult by asking them to support too much top growth in current conditions. Give them an easier life by pruning hard.
Res, not sure what you mean by your last post about snapping branches, but in the photograph, your shrubs still need cutting back by about half to encourage further branching out. This is beneficial to your shrubs. There is not a lot of growth because you have not reduce their size.
You also need to be a bit more patient with young shrubs, they can start quite slowly in the first few years. Regardless of heatwave or not, they are still not established yet, so you do need to keep on top of watering in the summer months.
If you'd cut them back earlier in the year as we suggested you'd have seen new growth almost immediately ... it'll take a bit longer now but it's still the right thing to do if you want a sturdy thick hedge with good coverage from top to bottom.
This weather I'd be giving each plant a bucket full of water every other day. Being so close to those trees the soil must be dry as a bone.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Posts
Grasp the nettle, take the bull by the horns, bite the bullet ...........
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
One way to think about it is you have paid for good strong roots and you are making their life difficult by asking them to support too much top growth in current conditions. Give them an easier life by pruning hard.
Res, not sure what you mean by your last post about snapping branches, but in the photograph, your shrubs still need cutting back by about half to encourage further branching out. This is beneficial to your shrubs. There is not a lot of growth because you have not reduce their size.
You also need to be a bit more patient with young shrubs, they can start quite slowly in the first few years. Regardless of heatwave or not, they are still not established yet, so you do need to keep on top of watering in the summer months.
This weather I'd be giving each plant a bucket full of water every other day. Being so close to those trees the soil must be dry as a bone.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.