New Hedge (Or a fence it seems)

[Lons]

I planted a typical mixed hedge to 2 sides of my paddock some 12 years ago. All bare rooted around 12 - 18ins high.

The majority were locally sourced but 100 beech came via mail order company (were imported from Holland I think).

Hawthorn, hazel, beech, holly, wild rose and a number of trees. About 250 metres in total was planted double row style with farmyard manure dug in and watered fot the first couple of months.

The hawthorn absolutely shot away as did the beech and rose. the others were slower. Interestingly, the dutch beech grew at almost twice the rate of the local stuff and as I had mixed them it was very obvious.

Whole hedge is pruned every year and within 3 years I had a solid 3-4ft solid hedge. Now kept at about 7ft and around 3 ft thick it's impenatrable athough some of the weaker plants have all but disappeared.

If you want to plant bare rooted plants, you're running out of time I think.

Bob

 

[Mike.C]

I realise that I'm in a different part of the world to you, and we get winter - every winter - but I planted pyrocanthus some 18 years ago. It reached the wall height (1.2m) within 3 years, and there it has stuck. It sticks it's head above it, and stops.
Leylandii here will grow, but if you get above 3m the bottom goes brown, and your're left with a hedge that is levelable at the top, but the bottom metre is a browwn tree trunk, so large gaps inbetween.
Rose wall hedging works solidly, eventually, 3m impenetrable after 6 years.
What i think I'm trying to say is you need to take local advice - not global forum advice.
Talk to your local (non-chain) garden centre, maybe ?

Laird is right, but I live in the North East of Scotland if pyracantha grows here (19 below this winter) I am sure that it will grown anywhere.

Cheers

Mike

 

[laird]

It's the east wind that stops it here Mike. We're (obviously) right on the coast and as soon as it grows out of the shelter of something else along comes a raw, salt laden easterly and burns it down to shelter level again.

 

[Digit]

Same problem here Laird, took us three years, starting with some 6ft Leylandii to get a shelter belt on the windward side. Till then little survived winter blasts. Mind you the wind speed record locally is 106 mph! :lol:

Roy.

 

[Mike.C]

It's the east wind that stops it here Mike. We're (obviously) right on the coast and as soon as it grows out of the shelter of something else along comes a raw, salt laden easterly and burns it down to shelter level again.

Ah yes that will make a huge difference. A few people that I know down in the town of Fraserburgh, live on streets that run up from sea, and when the wind picks up it can start stripping the paint/stain from their windows etc. It is so bad that they have to re-do them every few years. You would not believe it unless you seen it with your own eyes over a space of time.

You can also see the salt on the leaves of their evergreen plants in the winter.

There is so much salt coming off the sea that they do not have to salt the roads when it snows :roll: No not really but you know what I mean :lol:

Seriously I can see what you mean when you say that as soon as it grows over any shelter a plant would be damaged.

Cheers

Mike

 

[Dibs-h]

Pictures,

Here is a shot of the trees - where several to the left (start of the shot) are untouched and the ones alongside the garage have been "pruned",

And here is a shot from alongside the garage showing the "pruning",

Here's a closer one,

The spacing between the existing trees is about 2' and the gap between the trees and the wall is about 1'.

So it would seem logical to plant pyracantha , etc. in between the leyandii trunks and perhaps between the treeline and wall.

Going to examine the wall as well - all the coping stones were bedded in mortar - with it being a school playground makes sense - as the School's workmen have been using it as a platform, all the stones in the area affected have been seriously dislodged. I'm inclined to pop round in the morning and hand her a letter, demanding an immediate stop to any work on my side - i.e. there is guttering , etc. yet to be fitted where it is inevitable the workmen will stnd on the wall. Considering the damage they've caused so far - why let them continue? I'm wondering whether to state that I'm willing to obtain an injunction should the school feel they can continue.

 

[big soft moose]

I'm confused now as i cant see any need for the school to be working on yourside - assuming that the trees are on your land and that the wall in the pic isnt the boundary.

The workmen have no right to come onto your land without your permision so you dont need an "injunction" just state that it is trespass and you are not willing to tolerate it and will expect them to pay for all damage caused thus far

one point though i cant see pyrocantha or anything else for that matter suceeding where it is heavily overshaded by the leylandi hedge , with which it will also be in competition for water and nutrients - you might be better off with a fence up to pruned height.

 

[Dibs-h]

I'm confused now as i cant see any need for the school to be working on yourside - assuming that the trees are on your land and that the wall in the pic isnt the boundary.

The workmen have no right to come onto your land without your permision so you dont need an "injunction" just state that it is trespass and you are not willing to tolerate it and will expect them to pay for all damage caused thus far

one point though i cant see pyrocantha or anything else for that matter suceeding where it is heavily overshaded by the leylandi hedge , with which it will also be in competition for water and nutrients - you might be better off with a fence up to pruned height.

In the 1st picture you may be able to make out that the building (School's garage\outbuilding) has been re-roofed and one set of eaves is right up against the drystone wall (the boundry) So to make life easier - they've hacked the trees right back to allow the roofers, to

1. use the wall as a "platform"
2. remove the need for ladder beams, etc. and therefore make teh job quicker\easier\more profitable.

I suppose the thinking behind the "injunction" bit was probably along the lines of "trespass will no longer be tolerated and will be legally enfoirced if need be."

The plan has always been to lop the Leyandii down to about 4m - i.e. to about 1m taller (max) of where they've hacked them on the back. That would increase the amount of light in that gap - would that help matters? and as someone pointed out - need to water them a lot perhaps for them to "take"?

 

[Steve Jones]

Dibs,

Having now seen the pictures, I'm with BSM forget the pyracantha and just put up a fence of some description, The soil is going to be pretty worthless as there will be no nutrients left because the conifers will have taken everything out of the ground.

Steve

 

[Dibs-h]

Dibs,

Having now seen the pictures, I'm with BSM forget the pyracantha and just put up a fence of some description, The soil is going to be pretty worthless as there will be no nutrients left because the conifers will have taken everything out of the ground.

Steve

No mileage in "inter planting" between the Leyandii? - The gaps between the Leyandii is around 2'? Or perhaps removing the lower braches to say 1.5m high - opening things up a bit and then planting the wotsits in between the trees?

Quite happy to put a load of manure\etc down.

 

[Steve Jones]

Dibs,

TBH I think if you want to go down that route it would be trial and error as to whether or not the pyracantha survived. This is just my opinion, others may think differently.

Steve

 

[matt]

Nothing grows under any of our firs - not even weeds. And ours are individuals around the garden. Even the grass in a perfect semi-circle from the border around one dies off as soon as there is a dry spell. I believe firs also make the soil very acid.

 

[user 5053]

Pyracantha is not really regarded as a heding plant, more as an ornamental climbing plant. I would go for a mixture od kerria Japonia, escallionia, symphoticarpus, hazel, beech, thorn, forsythia and even things like Rosemary which are increasingly being used for hedging. I would also consider **** for low hedging. If you have a mixture it is better for bio diversity, wildlife and is generally more interesting. The kerria and forsythia will have a magnificent yellow flower in early spring.

 

[wobblycogs]

My 2p worth would be that it would be a dead loss to plant anything between those confiners. Anything planted there would have to be able to survive very dry acidic conditions and limited light. I think you'd be lucky to get anything to survive there for any amount of time.

I remember when I was growing up my father planted a row of beech along a boundry shaded by some big trees - but much less shaded that your plants would be. Ten years later when we moved out only about half were still alive and none had grown much bigger than a large bush.

 

[Lons]

Nothing grows under any of our firs - not even weeds. And ours are individuals around the garden. Even the grass in a perfect semi-circle from the border around one dies off as soon as there is a dry spell. I believe firs also make the soil very acid.

+1

Having seen the pics, it's a waste of time IMO to plant anything close to the conifers. Chance of survival is very poor and no real growth even if they don't die.

Put up a fence and push the school for the costs. they should get it back from the contractors who look as though they've done a crap job.

As far as I know,(in England anyway) they do have a legal right to enter your land to carry out repairs and maintenance to their property and trees but they must first either obtain consent or give a reasonable period of notice of intent.
In any event they must take care not to create damage and must fully restore any such damage that is caused.
They should also carry liability insurance and usually local authority won't award work if this is not in place.

 

[Dibs-h]

Cheers for the advice chaps. I suppose it's a bit of case of stuffed whichever way one goes. I'm not having a fence installed on my side of the conifers - which means it has to go on the other side of them. Now space might be a bit tight there - whilst it would be so easy to get a mini digger or something in - to whack the fence posts in, mechanised access isn't going to happen. There is a private drain from next door (running across the garden in the last 10 feet or so) - if that was to have problems - caused by a digger in my garden - the cost of fixing that would dwarf this little fisaco.

I suspect whoever comes to quote for the fence is going to charge premium - to have to get the posts in some other way. Having it on the school's side of the wall would be the way to go, but their outbuilding is built right upto the wall for a significant part - and that's where the problem is.

One option would be to cut down the conifers and install a fence - but the reason for the conifers (by the previous owner) was to absorb the noise, so I'm not willing to cut them down and increase the noise. Even if Pyracantha were planted alongside the fence - it could take ages to grow to a point of absorbing the noise.

I dare say this is going to be surreal - in terms of getting something that can be fitted, isn't easy to scale and dead easy to cut. Somehow I can see the suggestion of chainlink fence stapled\nailed to the trunks as the way forward coming from the School or the chap managing the contractors. :roll:

I'll be popping round in the morning with a letter fomally stating my "displeasure" with what the School's contractors have done, make a mention of aggravated trespass, etc. (wall & trees) & dumping of construction waste and let them know that I will be looking to have the damage assessed before deciding how to pursue the matter, but in the meantime should they require access - it must be requested beforehand (in writing) and should there be any further trespass (aggrevated or not) I won't hesitate to pursue the matter.

[I so want to say that further access may be supervised, due to the damage already done & should there be costs for this, the school will have to bear these - i.e. I ain't taking time off work - happy to instruct a surveyor (RICS or something) to oversee it.]

 

[Mike.C]

What a nightmare Dib's :evil: I have to agree with the others where they say that there is not much, if anything that is going to grow there. There's just not enough light and as someone else stated they would be fighting for water.

I cannot believe that their contractor just came into your garden and butchered your property :twisted: to such an extent that you have got to go through all these problems.

Good luck

Mike

 

[matt]

Is the boundary line as misleading as it looks from your pictures? By that I mean it *looks* at though your boundary is the wall/building line and beyond that, where the firs are planted, is someone else's (the schools). Not that this really makes much difference to the current situation - I'm just trying to get my head round whether they were completely stupid or made a genuine mistake? In the case of the latter I suspect you may achieve more by simply discussing the situation further rather than getting too heavy handed too early. They'll be far more receptive to sorting out the problem in the best way possible for you if you're on good talking terms - they're in a weak position so you should be able to use this to your advantage if you're pleasant but firm in both noting your annoyance and requirements to bring about an amicable solution.

 

[Dibs-h]

Is the boundary line as misleading as it looks from your pictures? By that I mean it *looks* at though your boundary is the wall/building line and beyond that, where the firs are planted, is someone else's (the schools). Not that this really makes much difference to the current situation - I'm just trying to get my head round whether they were completely stupid or made a genuine mistake? In the case of the latter I suspect you may achieve more by simply discussing the situation further rather than getting too heavy handed too early. They'll be far more receptive to sorting out the problem in the best way possible for you if you're on good talking terms - they're in a weak position so you should be able to use this to your advantage if you're pleasant but firm in both noting your annoyance and requirements to bring about an amicable solution.

You've got it the wrong way round - firs\garden are mine.

The 1st picture posted is from the School's playground showing the drystone wall - which is the boundary, the trees and their outbuilding.

The 2nd picture is taken stood in the the gap between the trees and the wall and taking a picture looking left - i.e. between the outbuilding & trees.

The trees are in the bottom of my garden and the drystone wall is the boundary.

 

[matt]

Oh, I see. The wall looks about 1ft thick and the trees appear quite tight against the wall? Which suggests that the school should have left branches about 1ft long sticking out from the trunk to be in the clear? Looking at the growth it would all have been old (brown) growth?