It is illegal to trim hedges after the end of February. But there is still time not only to cut them where necessary, but also to improve their structure and ensure their environmental value, perhaps by relocating them.
Humans have never seen a hedge properly laid, but this ancient practice is regaining popularity as we relearn its benefits in protecting wildlife and ensuring a healthy hedge life.
Hedgerows provide important shelter and an important food source for songbirds, mammals and insects.
They are often referred to as “networks for nature” as they provide safe passage for a variety of wildlife that can move between fields and forests out of the sight of predators.
Good hedges also provide valuable shelter for livestock and an attractive natural and extremely useful barrier separating fields and protecting new stretches of forest.
Around 50 years ago, with the intensification of agricultural production and the “modernization” of cultivation methods, the importance of hedges was partially forgotten. Before that, the practice of rejuvenating hedges and keeping them safe was common and ensured the preservation of dense, species-rich hedges that provided food and shelter for the then relatively rich animal world.
In the decades that followed, however, the land was largely drained and miles of hedgerows were bulldozed, often with farm improvement grants to enlarge fields and facilitate the use of larger tractors and other farm machinery.
This came at a huge cost to the landscape and the environment.
When tractor-mounted hedge trimmers came along, manual hedge trimming died out, largely due to the lack of labor and the cost of performing a task that requires a high level of skill and experience.
I still remember well from my childhood how the men laid the hedges in winter after tending the cattle and made sure that the farm remained stable for the coming grazing season.
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Cattle graze next to a hawthorn hedge at Aidan Maguire’s Farm in Antylstown, Navan, Co. Meath. Photo: Damien Eagers
Cattle graze next to a hawthorn hedge at Aidan Maguire’s Farm in Antylstown, Navan, Co. Meath. Photo: Damien Eagers
This was before the rise in contracting and the shortage of farm workers had not yet begun to make itself felt. Few farms have permanent employees these days, but hedgers can be hired.
It is worth laying small hedges yourself and working around the yard, perhaps one field at a time where necessary. A well-designed hedge is a thing of true beauty and a sound long-term investment.
The last time I had to plant some hedges on my farm in Meath I had to enlist the help of a number of professionals who had traveled from Leitrim and lived in a caravan on site while the work was being carried out.
The effort was worth it, because these overgrown and patchy hedges are now dense at the base, have grown luxuriantly and are fully sustainable.
There is no good mechanical substitute for rejuvenating a hedge.
The Irish Hedge-laying Association has a good website (heckenlegen.ie), and the Teagasc website has videos and other useful features on how bees, birds, bats, butterflies, and badgers, to name a few, need healthy hedges to survive and thrive.
Hawthorn is probably the most commonly grown species and, with proper care, makes an excellent fence as well as profuse flowering in spring and berries in fall.
Also widespread is the sloe, used to make walking sticks and the shillelagh, the weapon of choice during faction warfare in centuries past. But beware of that
malicious thorns.
I have many fond memories of sunny late fall afternoons picking sloes, blackberries and rose hips from my hedges. Foraging for wild food is a gift of nature and a rewarding pleasure
.
Joe Barry is a farmer and forester on the border between Meath and Kildare
https://www.independent.ie/business/farming/forestry-enviro/forestry/joe-barry-why-you-should-lay-your-hedges-and-improve-these-networks-for-nature-42324263.html Joe Barry: Why you should plant your hedges and improve those “networks for nature”.
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