Becch Hedge Care

GreeBo

Hey,

I have a Beech hedge thats about 2M wide and 2M high, I have recently trimmed it but I really want to take it back to about .5M wide by 1.5M high max to keep it more manageable.

Do I have to wait until Spring to do this or will it care if I do it now? Are there limits to have much it can be realistically cut back without killing it?

Also the hedge has some ivy (which I have mostly removed) but also Blackthorn and Holly within it.

There seem to be 2 established blackthorn bushes and 1 large holly bush within the tree.

My "plan" is to cut these out at ground level and remove them from the hedge, obviously this is going to leave large holes in the hedge. Will Beech fill these in and if so, how long will it take? I'm assuming it will and that regular pruning/trimming will encourage it to close the gap. There appears to be a couple of beech trees that have died so perhaps replacing them with saplings would be better/faster?

Cheers!

Lumen

Regarding filling the gaps, I have a similar problem (not with beech) and I'm planning to plant some saplings either in large pots or a spare bit of ground, in good light, and then transplant into the hedge when they're big enough to hold their own, at the right time of year.

GreeBo

Lumen wrote: »

Regarding filling the gaps, I have a similar problem (not with beech) and I'm planning to plant some saplings either in large pots or a spare bit of ground, in good light, and then transplant into the hedge when they're big enough to hold their own, at the right time of year.

Yeah I was thinking similar...I guess I wont know the extent of my issue until I remove the intruders.

Blackthorn is a beast to remove