Gardening – Tackling hedges

At this time of year, as the sun sinks lower on the horizon and shadows lengthen, my thoughts turn to pruning of evergreen hedges, ornamental trees and shrubs (except subtropicals, which should be pruned in late winter or early spring). One of my pet hates is huge, overgrown trees and shrubs that shade out the rest of the garden or, worse still, grow over the house causing rot, damage to paint and rotting leaves in the gutters and water supply.

Let’s tackle the hedges first: if these are allowed to keep growing upwards, not only do they create a shade issue for your garden and the neighbour, but in fact they stop being an effective sight screen, as the bottom branches become bare and leggy. Hedges can also take up valuable land; I’ve seen some that are up to 4 metres wide. When you multiply that by a typical section length of 25 or so metres, that hedge can be covering 100sqm of section!
Most hedge species can take a good hack and bounce back well; the first attempt might be best done by a commercial tree pruning company, with the resulting mulch being handy for the garden. Once it’s down to about a metre wide and two to three metres high, ongoing maintenance is easy with a hedge trimmer every three months or so to trim back the regrowth.

Shrubs are next (just remember that some shrubs are best pruned immediately after flowering if the flowers are the feature); again these can provide too much shade for surrounding plants and create damp, slippery areas on paths and up against houses. Before you oil up the loppers or fire up the chainsaw though, have a look at its natural growth habit.

For example, a tangled, twiggy grower like Chinese Lantern (Abutilon sp.) should be trimmed back hard from the outside in; good luck trying to prune it branch by branch from the inside! A more heavily branched shrub such as a Luculia or Camellia should have a combination of trimming back by up to a third and removal of some of the main branches to thin the shrub out. Many of the NZ natives can be thinned out as well, reducing both the height and density at the same time.

Trees are the biggest job and usually best left to the experts (speaking from a recent and painful experience for someone helping me – sorry Tony!). Don’t just let them keep growing out of control though, as this is false economy; it is much easier and cheaper to deal with a tree when it is smaller than when it is fully grown. Again, look at the natural habit and keep in mind what you are trying to achieve and then point out, or better still mark with paint, any limbs you want removed.

You might like to lift the tree to allow more light underneath or easy access for people and machinery. In that case a few lower limbs removed will do the trick. Limbs overhanging buildings or paths don’t always need to be removed entirely, sometimes just heading them back to the next fork is enough. If the tree is getting too big for the location, sometimes taking out the middle will do the trick, followed up a couple of years later by taking out the next biggest branches.

Once you start the chainsaw, watch out that, like me, you don’t get a case of chainsaw fever and within minutes find that not just one tree is pruned, but three have been felled altogether! I must admit, the lawn does look bigger without them though.