Very wise, it for the best although I know you’ll be wondering if you’re doing right🙂 i was just thinking that you may be able to take a Stanley knife down to the hessian and slice it up, if you cant remove it.
Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor.
A lot of people are confused when they see a large sack covering the entire root system of their plants and wonder whether or not they need to take it off. To solve any confusion, the answer is yes you should leave it on. The material covering your roots is called a hessian sack which is bio-degradable and will disintegrate over time, so there is no need to worry about having to take it off or any damage to the environment. It is important to leave the hessian sack on the roots as it holds them together and provides protection before they reach their final planting site. You can, if you wish, loosen the knot around the base of the trunk once the plant is in the ground, however this isn’t necessary. If you are unfamiliar with root balls, we have created a short video which will explain the different root types available.
I have only planted my rootball laurels 5 days ago.
Treatment of Laurel Hedge plants straight after planting
In terms of pruning, do nothing.Laurel is an evergreen and as such it is never truly dormant although activity in colder months is slow. Trimming the plants too soon means that the wounds will bleed without the roots having had time to establish and "drive" the plant. Infection is more likely as a result and damage from frost is more of a risk to newly cut tissue than plant bark.
Tomorrow gives freezing temperatures, I don't think I will cut back.
I have an old laurel hedge. 18 months ago I had to replace 4 of them. I had the exact same experience with mine. I decided to leave them and see how they went. I kept them well watered and after about 6 weeks they started to recover. They are now looking really well and have lots of nice new shoots. So my advice to you is, dont do anything for the time being and just be patient. They will come back.
I don't understand your comment - reading the text you copied from best4hedging.co.uk suggests you should have left the hessian sack on??? Which you did???
There may be a bit of bad weather here and there and in my opinion there is no rush for you to go out and prune them back if the weather is unstable and still too cold.
After seeing your photos, it's clear, your plants are not suffering too much, just bad luck with the wind and heavy rain that stripped leaves off. Once that has passed, you can cut them down as others have suggested. There is no big rush. Get yourself a pruning saw, a nice foldable one will be very useful for all types of pruning for medium sized branches, since you said some of the branches are quite thick.
With the hessian, it's totally up to you what you want to do. I would do what Lyn suggests, slash them or try to cut open the top section.
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Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
i was just thinking that you may be able to take a Stanley knife down to the hessian and slice it up, if you cant remove it.
Do you think I need to remove.
A lot of people are confused when they see a large sack covering the entire root system of their plants and wonder whether or not they need to take it off. To solve any confusion, the answer is yes you should leave it on. The material covering your roots is called a hessian sack which is bio-degradable and will disintegrate over time, so there is no need to worry about having to take it off or any damage to the environment. It is important to leave the hessian sack on the roots as it holds them together and provides protection before they reach their final planting site. You can, if you wish, loosen the knot around the base of the trunk once the plant is in the ground, however this isn’t necessary. If you are unfamiliar with root balls, we have created a short video which will explain the different root types available.
Nightmare
I have only planted my rootball laurels 5 days ago.
Treatment of Laurel Hedge plants straight after planting In terms of pruning, do nothing.Laurel is an evergreen and as such it is never truly dormant although activity in colder months is slow. Trimming the plants too soon means that the wounds will bleed without the roots having had time to establish and "drive" the plant. Infection is more likely as a result and damage from frost is more of a risk to newly cut tissue than plant bark.
Tomorrow gives freezing temperatures, I don't think I will cut back.
After seeing your photos, it's clear, your plants are not suffering too much, just bad luck with the wind and heavy rain that stripped leaves off. Once that has passed, you can cut them down as others have suggested. There is no big rush. Get yourself a pruning saw, a nice foldable one will be very useful for all types of pruning for medium sized branches, since you said some of the branches are quite thick.
With the hessian, it's totally up to you what you want to do. I would do what Lyn suggests, slash them or try to cut open the top section.
Please can you let me know what you ended up doing and how your hedge responded?