wildlife hedges and hedging

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Trees and Hedge Plants
Mixed hedgerows are important wildlife habitats, providing food, nesting sites and shelter for birds, small mammals and insects. A hedgerow also provides safe corridors for small mammals to travel from one area to another, and songposts and viewpoints for birds to perch on. Once your hedge is established (after 3 years or so), you can further increase its wildlife value by planting climbers such as Honeysuckle and Wild Clematis to wind their way amongst the hedge plants. Honeysuckle is popular with moths, butterflies, bees and birds - thrushes, robins, tits and blackbirds will feast on the berries and seeds, and another bird in particular, the Pied Flycatcher, uses Honeysuckle bark as part of its nesting material. Wild Clematis provides food and nesting material for birds, moths and bees. The information contained in the links below show just how many species of butterfly, moth, bird, mammal and other insects our native trees support. Some are veritable micro-cities for wildlife. Hedgerows in the coutryside have declined dramatically over the years, their decline in turn affecting the numbers of wildlife. By planting even one native tree you will be helping wildlife in some way.

Planting a Wildlife Hedge
You can plant your hedge as a single row of plants, about 30 cm or so apart, or as a staggered double hedge with 30 cms or so between rows. As a rough guide (and guidelines vary from hedge supplier to hedge supplier!) plan for 4 plants per metre length - although you could vary this depending on how dense you want the hedge. If you are not able to plant as soon as you receive the hedging, then heel in the plants by digging a small, narrow trench and laying them in at a 45 degree angle. If they only have to sit a day or so you could keep them in a bucket of water. To suppress weeds and aid water conservation for the plants, mulch the base of your hedge. Once planted, trim off half the height of the hedge and then for the first two or three years remove at least half of the new growth. Once your hedge is established, trim it every third year - but never trim during nesting season (1 March to 1 September). In fact, it is an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 to intentionally destroy a nest that is used or being used. It is more ideal to trim in February to allow the nuts and berries to be available for a longer period to birds and mammals.

Maintenance of Your Wildlife Hedge
Trim well for the first two or three years to encourage bushiness. As mentioned above, once established, the hedge can be kept trimmed every two or three years. The best shape for a hedge is A shaped as this allows light and rain to reach the bottom of the hedge. Once your hedge is growing well, you can then introduce wild climbers. Planting them before the hedge is well established will result in the hedge plants being overwhelmed and strangled. It is also a good idea to plant hedegrow wildflowers at the base to provide extra cover for birds and mammals and additional food sources for other wildlife. Include here such plants as White Campion, Hedge Bedstraw, Greater Stitchwort, Wild Primrose, Black Horehound, Agrimony, Red Campion, Wild Basil, Wild Srawberry and Nettle-leaved Bellflower (these and other hedgerow plants are all available from us!)

What Trees to Plant
First of all, you need to consider what sort of hedge you are aiming for - is it going to be a wildlife hedge, a security hedge or barrier, for example. If you are planning to plant a wildlife hedge you need to bear in mind that this will not be regularly pruned and so will grow tall, and so you need to ensure you haev the space for it - a single row hedge could grow to be as much as 5 ft wide when fully mature after a number of years; a double row hedge even wider! If you want a hedge primarily as a barrier against intruders you might want to consider predominantly thorny plants. If, on the other hand, your hedge is just serving as a boundary or divider then you an quite happily trim it every year - but at the expense of fruits and berries for wildlife. The most wildlife-friendly hedge includes Hawthorn as the bulk of its make-up. Again, opinion varies as to how much Hawthorn to include, ranging from 25% to 75%. However much hawthorn you decide to incorporate, plant up the rest of the hedge with around four other species in varying amounts. It is a good idea to look at other native hedges in your surrounding area to see what plants they consist of and then plant the same in your hedge so that you are keeping your plants native to your local area.

Of course, the hedge doesn't have to be mixed species, it could all be of one variety. You don't even have to have room for a whole hedge - just a few or even one native tree will be of some wildlife value.
Incorporate hedgerow trees (such as Crab Apple, Field Maple and Hazel) intermittently in the hedge, which you can let grow a bit taller than the hedge.