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Cutting back of Elm Hedge
Craig Ashton-Potter
Posts: 1
We have just bought a property with a very well established Elm Hedge. Its about 6ft tall and varies from 3ft to 5ft wide along its length of 100ft. The problem is its the boundary hedge to the public foot path in front of out house. Despite it being very well kept over the years is has obviously widened over time and needs to be reduced in width and maybe height. Looking into the hedge you can see a strong structure about 2ft in so it looks as if it can be given a hefty cut back and still keep its shape.
Can this be done with elm?
How is this best done?
What time of year would be the best so not to shock the hedge too much?
Any kind of after care required?
Craig from Tidmarsh
0
Posts
How lovely to have a healthy elm hedge. I'm from East Anglia where we lost all our mature elms to Dutch Elm disease - younger elm growth seems not to get infected, so it is important that elm hedges are managed properly to keep the growth young and disease free.
This http://www.dedhamvalestourvalley.org/assets/Publications/Biodiversity/Elm-hedgerows.pdf has lots of information which should be useful.
Good luck - it would be interesting to hear how it goes.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.