Gardening Techniques

Planting a Hedge – Essential Planning Decisions

Before embarking on any practical actions, it is worth considering the reasons for planting a hedge in the first place. A little thought in the early stages can help avoid some expensive mistakes in terms of finance, time investment and effort.

A hedge forms a barrier in your garden. It is the green equivalent to a wall in your house and it can serve a number of purposes, for example:

• Dividing off different sections of your garden like a room divider in your house
• Hiding some less pleasing feature of the garden such as a shed, or screening a view that you prefer not to see from your garden
• Providing privacy perhaps from neighbours or casual passers by
• Acting as a sound barrier, for example to deaden the sound of passing traffic
• Providing security by preventing access to your property
• Protecting plants and other garden features from damaging weather conditions
• Offering a home and possibly a food-store for garden wildlife

Having decided the purpose (or purposes) of your hedge, you are in a better position to select the most appropriate plants to form the hedge, estimate how many plants you need and how much space they will occupy.

For example, if you want a hedge to screen out an ugly view, you will want it to be effective all year round. Many, though not all, deciduous plants would not be appropriate since they lose their leaves in winter.

On the other hand, if your only requirement is security or perhaps to control the movement of animals, you will want something that is as difficult as possible to penetrate but all year round foliage might be of little consequence (also see Hedge Laying).

It's also worth bearing in mind that hedges take considerable time to become established and should be considered as more or less permanent features of your garden, so a little careful planning beforehand can help avoid costly mistakes.

Having thought about the purpose, you are ready to decide on the plants to use for your hedge. To some extent, this will depend on your soil and prevailing climate. For most of us, cost will also be important. Click over to some of our advertisers to give you some ideas and act as a guide to selecting what is most appropriate.

However, since local conditions are also important, you would be wise to visit your local garden centres and nurseries, as well as walking your local area to see what is thriving in other people's gardens.

You need to decide on the plants you intend to use, but don't buy them just yet because there is plenty of preparation to do before you are ready to plant them.