Thanks @JennyJ and @Lynn - with regards the boundary; I can wait but the 'perfect house / perfect garden' neighbours on one side are audibly moaning (although not to our faces lol) as their previous privacy will be affected in the short term at any rate. As it happens the wire fence will suffice and they can moan all they like . . .!
I'm not confident using whips so will probably buy small pots anyway (have found an online supplier selling for circa £1.50 per plant) . . If I do wait till Autumn, and on the basis that the entire area (up to either demise/fence line on both sides) will have been dug up / turned over levelled and prepped for total turfing I have following questions.
1 - What date is Autumn exactly? End of Sept?
2 - Should I turf to the edge of the wire fences (next couple of weeks) and then dig a border for the hedge come Autumn? This seems like a lot of work . . .OR
3 - Do I leave the turfing runs 1.5-2ft short of the fence as this will be effectively have already been 'dug up' and hey presto ready made borders minus the effort
4 - If I do undertake item 3 (on your advice) what do I need to do to protect the exposed earth? Other than keeping the weeds down, should I feed / compost / water / get nutrient rich in readiness for Autumn planting? Does this exposed area need protecting with some kind of cover (eg. mulch?) Do I need to 'edge' a formal border?
Hi Chris, you want rain to water your hedge for you, so end of Sept is fine, the ‘Indian Summer’ will almost certainly be over by then. Do not lay the turf up to the boundary. It’s a waste if you only have to remove it and removing grass is really hard work. Just break up the bare earth with a fork and get rid of weeds that appear. Prepare the ground with your chicken pellets or bags of manure (or whatever you pick) before planting in Sept. You could mulch your bare earth now to keep it neat and keep weeds down, but I wouldn’t bother. (Mulching with chipped bark after planting would look good and help your hedge. ) For now, I would dig a small trench to separate the new grass from the hedge border so I could cut a crisp, sharp edge on my new lawn. It will look good.
1. Here (South Yorkshire), I would say early-mid September unless there's a late heatwave. Maybe later if you're further south.
2/3. Save money on turf and leave strips wide enough for the hedge's ultimate width. You don't want to plant right on the border but far enough in so it won't overhang the boundary too much (your neighbours are allowed to cut it back to the boundary).
4. Just keep the weeds down (for appearance and so that they don't set seed which would give you weeds for years to come). If your soil is poor/lacking in organic matter you can add rotted manure or garden compost. If your soil is good already then it might not be needed. Use some bone meal or similar at planting time. You want to encourage root growth in Autumn. If you like you can use a more general fertilizer next spring. You don't need to water bare soil - that would just encourage weeds. Covering the soil (mulch, landscape fabric, plastic, cardboard etc) would keep weeds down but the fabric could be expensive and plastic or cardboard doesn't look too good. For a couple of months I'd just weed it once a week. Edging is a matter of taste and the style of your garden. You can just clip the lawn edges to keep them tidy if that suits you. If you just mow, the grass will gradually spread into the hedge area (maybe not this year, but in future years).
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
I would leave the turf 3’ from the fence and put the plants in 2’ away from the fence, that way, when they extend into you neighbours, they can cut off their side without damaging the plants . The hedge will grow to about 4 ft deep if you keep it pruned back but by then it won’t matter what grows under it, they’re as tough as old boots.
I’d still go for bare roots though. They will have been grown outside so already acclimatised and the roots will be stronger as they haven’t t been confined in a pot.
Easier to plant, just dig a hole and drop it in, fill in firmly and trickle some bone meal round the edge about 6” from the stem.
Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor.
Thanks for all the advice - so to summarise (apols this needs to be idiot proof - my gardening skill ends at mowing and hedgecutting)
1 - Get landscapers to dig up all areas well and ensure all old roots / stumps / sh@te / previous hamster graves are removed and the earth is fully turned over and good to go.
2 - Landscapers Plant timber stakes and wire fence to allocate boundary lines on both sides (2x 25m parallel runs).
3 - Landscapers Lay turf accordingly leaving 2ft exposed soil border along both fence lines.
4 - On completion landscapers dig trench in turf border to create neat edge
5 - Pull faces at neighbours on irritating side for comedy value
6 - Keep borders weed free (every week) and keep border soil turned over until Sept
7 - Apply chicken pellets / fertilizer to weed free border beds 2 weeks prior to planting
8 - Dig spaced holes (5x plants every 2M?) and sprinkle Mychoryzil fungi in base (or not)
9 - Plant whips / small potted plants, sprinkle water and apply blood/fish/bone
8 - Water accordingly and then cover with mulch?
9 - Add bamboo stakes to encourage vertical growth?
10 - Pray! What do I need to do (periodically) from this point on / season to season?
Please feel free to copy/paste/edit the above if incorrect / wrong. Need to get this right first time!
Also -
Griselinia New Zealand or Portuguese Laurel . . ?
PS. Any thing to look out for on the turfing? Assume if this is prepped properly and I keep it sprinkled in the evenings (daily) all should be well!
I think @Lyn 's suggestion of 3' wide borders is better than 2' (if I remember rightly she has a laurel hedge so she'll know how wide it wants to be).
Give them a good watering (can without the rose or hosepipe without the nozzle) rather than a sprinkle - aim to water the soil around the base of the plants, not the leaves/stems.
Small plants shouldn't need staking. The wire fence will give them a little bit of protection from wind.
You might be better to leave edging the new lawn until it's growing well and you can walk on it (if the lawn is rectangular the edges should be pretty straight anyway).
Then keep the area around the hedge well weeded and watered until it's well established. Many people fail by stopping the watering too soon. They'll still need water in the second summer if it's a dry one.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
Number 3...leave 3’ border. I would say No to number 7. but yes to number 9. Not down the hole, on the surface then slightly did it in. No to the first number 8. Not necessary. 1st 9. Not sprinkle water, soak. No to number 9 definitely stakes. Tread in on planting. Can you show a photo of the trees once you’ve planted them and we can advise how much and where to cut off the tops.
Lots of water on planting, and every week or less if have a drought. With the lawn, hose pipe on all evening every night. Last of all, two fingers up to neighbours , and shout....’its done!’ Do come back if there’s anything else you want to know, anything at all, and show us the trees once planted for next advise.
Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor.
Not much to add, but we have put a couple of (much shorter) hedges in over the last two years and definitely go bare root - you will save a huge amount of money for the length of hedge you are planning and the plants will do better as well - plus they'll be easier/quicker to plant. One thing we did with our hedges was to install a soaker hose along the full lengths at the time of planting. Made watering so much easier - just connect to tap/hose and leave for a couple of hours. I'm not sure about 50m soaker hoses but I guess there must be something.. Sounds like you are set on something evergreen and more on the formal side, but 100m of mixed native (hawthorn based) hedge would look fabulous and be an incredible asset to the local wildlife (cheap as chips as 30cm bare root whips too)! Native hedges also grow like the clappers, and with a few flowering varieties in the mix they can look stunning as well..
Just to summarise - whips planted in autumn will be cheaper and grow faster and have a higher success rate than more expensive plants in pots. Agree that 3' wide will be better than a 2' wide border.
I planted 50 whips of hawthorn in well prepared soil one autumn in my last garden, pruned them back to 9" high, watered and left them to get on with it. They grew 6' the following season and were then cut back by half to encourage them to thicken out. We subsequently kept them to 6' high and they ended up almost that wide - great windbreak between us and the arable field behind and home to lots of wildlife.
Avoid Portuguese laurel as it is a thug and desperately dull and the torn leaf edges look awful when trimmed with hedge trimmers so you have to rpune it with secateurs to keep it looking half decent and that is a time-consuming PITA.
Mix it up. If you like photinia, put one or two in the mix. We have inherited a hedge here which has viburnum, choisya, philadelphus, photinia and several more plants repeated thru it. Good screen with year round interest and the birds and insects love it.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
The diggers are in and there's a lot of roots on the demise that in some instances have been a bugger to remove (3-4ft pits to enable the digger to prise out the established roots balls etc)
How key is removing all the root spread in totality - not only in terms of the borders to be created for the hedging (as per this thread) but also the new turf etc which will be the mainstay of the new 'blank canvas' garden? Will loose / cut roots eventually break down etc - do I need to rotavate the borders / turf areas thoroughly before levelling etc?
Posts
I'm not confident using whips so will probably buy small pots anyway (have found an online supplier selling for circa £1.50 per plant) . . If I do wait till Autumn, and on the basis that the entire area (up to either demise/fence line on both sides) will have been dug up / turned over levelled and prepped for total turfing I have following questions.
1 - What date is Autumn exactly? End of Sept?
2 - Should I turf to the edge of the wire fences (next couple of weeks) and then dig a border for the hedge come Autumn? This seems like a lot of work . . .OR
3 - Do I leave the turfing runs 1.5-2ft short of the fence as this will be effectively have already been 'dug up' and hey presto ready made borders minus the effort
4 - If I do undertake item 3 (on your advice) what do I need to do to protect the exposed earth? Other than keeping the weeds down, should I feed / compost / water / get nutrient rich in readiness for Autumn planting? Does this exposed area need protecting with some kind of cover (eg. mulch?) Do I need to 'edge' a formal border?
Please keep helping - its invaluable!
Cheers Chris
The hedge will grow to about 4 ft deep if you keep it pruned back but by then it won’t matter what grows under it, they’re as tough as old boots.
I’d still go for bare roots though. They will have been grown outside so already acclimatised and the roots will be stronger as they haven’t t been confined in a pot.
Easier to plant, just dig a hole and drop it in, fill in firmly and trickle some bone meal round the edge about 6” from the stem.
Thanks for all the advice - so to summarise (apols this needs to be idiot proof - my gardening skill ends at mowing and hedgecutting)
1 - Get landscapers to dig up all areas well and ensure all old roots / stumps / sh@te / previous hamster graves are removed and the earth is fully turned over and good to go.
2 - Landscapers Plant timber stakes and wire fence to allocate boundary lines on both sides (2x 25m parallel runs).
3 - Landscapers Lay turf accordingly leaving 2ft exposed soil border along both fence lines.
4 - On completion landscapers dig trench in turf border to create neat edge
5 - Pull faces at neighbours on irritating side for comedy value
6 - Keep borders weed free (every week) and keep border soil turned over until Sept
7 - Apply chicken pellets / fertilizer to weed free border beds 2 weeks prior to planting
8 - Dig spaced holes (5x plants every 2M?) and sprinkle Mychoryzil fungi in base (or not)
9 - Plant whips / small potted plants, sprinkle water and apply blood/fish/bone
8 - Water accordingly and then cover with mulch?
9 - Add bamboo stakes to encourage vertical growth?
10 - Pray! What do I need to do (periodically) from this point on / season to season?
Please feel free to copy/paste/edit the above if incorrect / wrong. Need to get this right first time!
Also -
Griselinia New Zealand or Portuguese Laurel . . ?
PS. Any thing to look out for on the turfing? Assume if this is prepped properly and I keep it sprinkled in the evenings (daily) all should be well!
cheers Chris
I would say No to number 7. but yes to number 9. Not down the hole, on the surface then slightly did it in.
No to the first number 8. Not necessary.
1st 9. Not sprinkle water, soak.
No to number 9 definitely stakes. Tread in on planting.
Can you show a photo of the trees once you’ve planted them and we can advise how much and where to cut off the tops.
Lots of water on planting, and every week or less if have a drought.
With the lawn, hose pipe on all evening every night.
Last of all, two fingers up to neighbours , and shout....’its done!’
Do come back if there’s anything else you want to know, anything at all, and show us the trees once planted for next advise.
Sounds like you are set on something evergreen and more on the formal side, but 100m of mixed native (hawthorn based) hedge would look fabulous and be an incredible asset to the local wildlife (cheap as chips as 30cm bare root whips too)! Native hedges also grow like the clappers, and with a few flowering varieties in the mix they can look stunning as well..
I planted 50 whips of hawthorn in well prepared soil one autumn in my last garden, pruned them back to 9" high, watered and left them to get on with it. They grew 6' the following season and were then cut back by half to encourage them to thicken out. We subsequently kept them to 6' high and they ended up almost that wide - great windbreak between us and the arable field behind and home to lots of wildlife.
Avoid Portuguese laurel as it is a thug and desperately dull and the torn leaf edges look awful when trimmed with hedge trimmers so you have to rpune it with secateurs to keep it looking half decent and that is a time-consuming PITA.
Mix it up. If you like photinia, put one or two in the mix. We have inherited a hedge here which has viburnum, choisya, philadelphus, photinia and several more plants repeated thru it. Good screen with year round interest and the birds and insects love it.
Few more questions (I'll post photos later)
The diggers are in and there's a lot of roots on the demise that in some instances have been a bugger to remove (3-4ft pits to enable the digger to prise out the established roots balls etc)
How key is removing all the root spread in totality - not only in terms of the borders to be created for the hedging (as per this thread) but also the new turf etc which will be the mainstay of the new 'blank canvas' garden? Will loose / cut roots eventually break down etc - do I need to rotavate the borders / turf areas thoroughly before levelling etc?
Cheers Chris