Hedge Matters

 As always, I was half-way through a gardening job yesterday when I thought, ‘I should have taken a ‘before’ photo so people will be amazed at the transformative nature of my toil when they see the ‘after’ photo,’ but I didn’t, and there it is. 

I hadn’t planned to do a major gardening job. I happened to be putting some bits into the recycling bin, which is on the driveway, and I spotted some tufts of mare’s tail in the block paving. I thought, I’ll just hoick those out,’ because mare’s tail is a nightmare and needs heading off at the pass at every opportunity. So, I nipped out the mare’s tail and then I found myself perusing the leylandii hedge that separates our front drive from that of our neighbours. It looks a bit like this - solid, dense, green, smells nice, about 4 feet high and 12 feet long: 

Now, a few weeks ago, our neighbour - Don - collared me and said would we mind getting rid of this hedge because he was becoming increasingly worried about keeping all his garden hedges neat and tidy in his elderly years and was taking steps to either drastically reduce their heights or get rid of them altogether. Don is 83. Also, he hates leylandii hedges, and this one was installed by the people who lived in Damson Cottage about twenty five years or so ago. 

I said I did not object AT ALL to removing the hedge because over the last ten years I’ve watched Don brutally attacking the top of it with his hedge trimmer, leaving it looking, well, brown and dead, until it would courageously find the strength to put on a bit of green and look a bit more cheerful and attractive. Also, because of its dense nature, it’s been a highway for mice, enabling them to climb into Andy’s car engine (he tended to park the nose of his car in the hedge) and either chew through cables, store a variety of nuts and seeds, or die in often inaccessible parts of the engine. No more hedge, no more mice malarkey. What’s not to like about removing this hedge? 

We agreed to wait until August because Don’s wife, Gill, was concerned about nesting birds. Wagtails, especially, have been known to frequent the hedge, also liking it as a highway to access Andy’s car, so they can use it as a toilet facility. We also discussed ‘Methods of Removal’ which mostly involved Andy and his chainsaw. Cut the leylandii off at their bases (there were twelve of them) and then dig up the roots.

However, in the last week or two, I’ve seen Don gazing mournfully at the hedge. I’d given it a bit of a ruffle and was pretty certain there were no nests therein. I thought, I wonder how much in-road I could make with my loppers because I’d also been thinking about Andy and the chainsaw and reckoned that if I could prune back as much of the lush and rampant top growth as possible, then accidents were less likely to happen. 

I fetched my loppers and soon discovered that I could chop out large bits of hedge quite easily. This is good, thought I. This is VERY satisfying! And so I continued, ducking inside when the rain came down in stair rods, but mostly working on, because I am stoic and was now on a mission. 

Don appeared. He looked very cheerful at the rapid disappearance of the hedge. I say ‘disappearance’ but it was merely manifesting itself as an increasingly huge pile of debris in the middle of our driveway. I carried on lopping, Don carried on chatting. At one point, Don tried to wrestle the loppers from me and insist I have a cup of tea, but I’d had one only twenty minutes previously when rain shower stopped play. I wasn’t about to surrender my loppers, regardless of Don’s obvious lopper envy. I was having too much fun. 

Andy appeared and started loading the hedge debris into his car to take to the tip. Meanwhile, I’d cut back of all the green stuff and was giving the stumps and experimental push to see how much give they had in them which wasn’t much given we are on clay here. I thought, I’ll tackle those at the weekend. Don disappeared and came back armed with a spade. I then felt obliged to get MY spade because one should not leave an 83 year old to try digging up tree stumps on his own. 

We spent the next two or three hours digging around these stumps and hacking at the roots. Conifer roots are shallow BUT these were also broad, like tap roots. Two came up fairly easily, but the next three proved more stubborn. I knew it was time to call it a day when I was heaving on Number Five in a backwards  Sumo-like squat pose motion , and it suddenly gave way, and I tipped over backwards into the lavender border under our front window and smacked my head on the wall. I lay there for a moment, felt okay and got up. But Don was immediately in Concussion And Certain Death mode, and it was also gone half past four and Nell was staring at me from the window because it was her tea-time. 

This morning, my head is fine, I don’t feel stiff or achey at all, which is surprising, but my left buttock feels like it’s suffered a shot gun wound a la Forrest Gump. I’ve walked Nell in the teeming rain (yes, we both got soaked. I have just ordered myself a long waxed coat because my current ‘rain’ coat ought to be sued for trade’s description) but the rest of the day will be gentle and refined on the activity front. 

And here is the genuine ‘after’ photo of the almost ex-hedge. Seven more stumps to go…

I’m going to replace it on our side with a nice row of lavender.