Advice on how to help my beech hedge up

Hi

This summer after moving into our house, I have finally started to tackle the garden but as you will see from the pictures the beech hedge is not growing very well.

Is there any advice you have to help get it up and nurture it along?

The hedge has been there for over two years I am told. According to what I have searched and read on this site - it should be well established by now?

I started putting down underlay and stones to keep grass down and give it room to grow. I also bought some potted hedge in mid aug but not sure if they have taken as you will see from some of the brown leafed trees. i planted these to replace some trees that got damaged with excessive strimming to cut down the grass around them :-)

Thanks for your input and help on this.

Neil

 

Hello and welcome.

If its only 2 year old, it is unlikely to be what you'd call 'well established' yet. We've had a long hot dry spell over the last few weeks. Unless you've been watering them regularly and thoroughly, they'll be dehydrated. Most probably shut down in survival mode. All plants do this. When there is not enough water available for normal growth, lots of chemistry happens. Basically they close all the pores in the leaves so they are not metabolising, photosynthesis almost completely stops, and growth stops completely, with the only activity being just the bare essentials to keep the plant alive. The consequence is your plants may look lush and green, but not actually growing.

 

Hi

Thanks for the quick reply - I forgot to attached pictures in my original post.
You will see that parts are growing better.

 

Why is there about a 6 inch strip of grass all along that is dead, while the rest of the grass is fine? Has something been put down around the gravel.

 

Added a few more pics to show the difference in growth areas.

Thanks again for all the help on this.

Best Regards
NeilB

 

We sprayed the edge of the stones with Weed Killer.

 

7 years to get an established hedge. It should look "hedge like" after 3, good after 5 and like a proper hedge after 7. Provided it is well cared for of course

If there was grass there before that will have significantly reduced the growth rate - the grass will take both water and nutrients away from the hedge.

Ideally put a leaky-hose under the membrane (you need woven weed suppressing membrane, as ordinary weed fabric - such as is put down to stop weeds growing through paths - will make the rain run off, rather than soak in).

After competition from the grass, lack of irrigation whilst the plants are getting established is probably the likely cause of poor growth or plants dying. Other causes would be poor drainage / heavy soil (Beech is not good on heavy clay soils) and perhaps wind - it looks a bit exposed where the hedge is? Given the strong looking fence an option would be to attach scaffolder's debris netting to the fence to act as a bit of a windbreak. It would help if the fence is on the side of the prevailing wind, but a windbreak will help even if on the "wrong" side.

Nip out the leading bud at the top, and at the end of all side shoots, during the winter (until the plants get too big for it to be "doable") and that will help them bush up.

Trim the hedge in late June for any branches that are more than 18" from the centre of the plant - they tend to grow some vigorous branches! and better it channels its energy into bushing up - and then "face" it in June about 6" narrower than the final width, letting it get a bit wider each year until about 5 years when you can be trimming it to final-width. Try to keep a "batter" on the hedge (narrower at the top than the bottom) to let the light get to the bottom.

 

I've got the opposite problem, Ardmhacha24 - the Beech Hedge that I've 'inherited' is 'over-established' and I've had to try to 'tame it' in an effort to regain some sort of control over it .

Thanks for the advice you gave, Kristen. That's what I like so much about this forum - you never know what advice you'll find popping up

Mine stands on an area of sloping grass, but somewhere in its past, it was allowed to become 'level' - so it's about 5ft high at its lowest point and around 8ft at its highest point - where I can't quite reach with the shears. I'm not even sure how wide it is at its widest point as the other side is 'next-door's' - and unless the next tenant 'makes an effort with it', it's going to be a v-e-r-y hard job to deal with.

 

Polite way of saying "Ask two gardeners and get three opinions", eh?

 

no - not what I meant - sorry if it came out all wrong .

I'm just delighted to see how helpful everybody is .

 

Hi All

Back again and looking for your guidance on if I should cut back now or wait for another while.

Since my original post I put up wind breaker and this appears to have helped the hedge to come on. As you can see from the pictures I have attached - they are growing well.

But how and when should I cut them back - do I need to wait until the end of the summer? Do I now need to cut them back hard? I want it to stay the height of the fence.

Thanks for all your help and guidance.

 

They look spot-on how I would expect, well cared-for, Beech hedging to look I am certain that the windbreak will have helped a lot.

There are schools of though about chopping new hedges down by 1/3rd to get them to thicken at the bottom, but it varies from variety to variety - certainly important NOT to do that for conifers

I took the growing tip out of mine - both the leader and every single side shoot/branch - for the first 3 years. Years 1 & 2 are a lot less work than year 3 !! Wait until the winter and then use secateurs to just nip off the very last bud on each stem.

But you might want to research the benefits of chopping back by 1/3rd (but that too would happen when dormant, in the Winter). In particular you have planted a single row, whereas mine are double rows, so I might have been more likely to get away without chopping hard back.

I would ask someone like Ashridge Trees for their opinion - perhaps in the guise that you are thinking of planting a Beech hedge??

 

P.S. I would trim the sides. Again I would use secateurs and trim any side branch that is wider than some imaginary line where you think the final width would be. In the first couple of years that would be 6" - 12" inside the finished width, so perhaps 2' out from the stem? and with a decent batter (wider at bottom than top) even if your finished hedge is going to be more vertical-sided. You will get some "strong" branches growing vigorously sideways, so chopping the excess length off those (in July probably, could be earlier in the year, or even two or three times in the season) will get them to sprout side branches and thicken up. The Batter will ensure that enough light gets to the bottom to make that thicken up too. Once it is thick a more vertical side will be fine (although the purists will tell you that you still need a good batter, but I've seen many a grand hedge with vertical sides - but I suspect that they had a good batter when they were young)

 

"I would trim the sides" - You would recommend to do it now?