GARDENING

The Newt in Somerset

Know your boundaries

While your plants lay dormant, now is the ideal time to construct some natural boundaries, says Elly West. Here, she explains how to create everything from strong design statements to wildlife-boosting borders

Gardens may vary in size and shape, but one thing they have in common is the need to mark the boundaries in some way. Often this will be with walls or fences, but I personally love the impact of a well-kept hedge. Now is the ideal time to plant a new hedge, while the plants are dormant, and in time for spring and summer.

A hedge is a living wall made of plants. Some are decorative and make a strong design statement, such as the low box-hedge parterres of the Victorian era, or even a hedge maze. Others provide a practical function, acting as a boundary, privacy screen or windbreak. They can be used to break up a space and create different zones, giving structure, leading your eye around the garden and, depending on what plants you choose, they are extremely versatile. A hedge can be formal or informal, evergreen or deciduous, with interesting leaves, flowers or fruits. Hedges are cheaper and easier to install than fencing, as well as being longer-lasting and more interesting. They provide a habitat and shelter for wildlife, and create a good foil for other plants. In spring, you'll have fresh new growth, in summer, perhaps flowers and a home for nesting birds, then the possibility of autumn fruits, and in winter they are the architecture of the garden, carrying frost and snow.

Choosing a hedge is an important decision. You'll need to consider the specific requirements such as the height and size you want it to be maintained at, and whether you want it to be evergreen or deciduous. A formal hedge is likely to be a single species for a uniform look. Yew is a fantastic option and can be kept small as an alternative to box hedging, or left to grow to several metres. Its soft, dark green needles make a beautiful backdrop for other plants. However, it's fairly slow growing compared to other options, so you'll need patience.

Other conifers can be grown as hedges, including the notorious Leyland cypress, or leylandii. It's extremely fast growing (up to a metre per year), and has been at the centre of thousands of disputes between neighbours, so either avoid, or be prepared to cut it back two or three times a year to keep it fully under control.

There are plenty of other evergreen options, including Portuguese laurel, which has attractive slender dark-green leaves and reddish stems, or Griselinia, with glossy apple-green leaves. This dense, lowmaintenance evergreen grows on most soil types in sun or shade, and is tolerant of wind and salt, so good for coastal gardens.

Semi-evergreens include privet – ever popular for good reason as it's tough, easy to grow and maintain, and there are attractive variegated varieties available with leaves edged with golden-yellow or cream. Beech is deciduous when grown as a tree, but beech hedges tend to hold their leaves after they've turned brown until the new growth comes through in spring, giving you cover all year round. Beech can be kept fairly low – at around 1.2m – or allowed to grow tall. The tallest hedge in the world is a 30m beech hedge in Perthshire, Scotland. Hornbeam is very similar and is a better choice if you're planting on heavy clay soil.

Box hedging (Buxus sempervirens) is the classic choice for low hedging and edging around the garden, but can be susceptible to blight or the dreaded box caterpillar. The latter is still mostly confined to areas of the south-east but unfortunately present across the UK, so check around your neighbourhood and if you see dead, brown box bushes then it's probably best to avoid. Ilex crenata, a type of smoothleaved holly, makes a good alternative. Likewise, on the road where I live any viburnum hedges in the front gardens are ragged with viburnum beetle by mid-summer. I took mine out and replaced it with silver-leaved privet.

If you want something less formal that will also attract wildlife, then there are lots of native hedge mixes offering berries and flowers. These may include hawthorn, dog rose, field maple, hazel and blackthorn. Since the middle of the last century we've lost around fifty per cent of our hedgerows in the UK, so anything we can do in our gardens to benefit birds and other wildlife will help to redress the balance.

Other flowering plants that make good hedging include Rosa rugosa, escallonia and camellia. Lower-growing options are choisya, hardy fuchsia, lavender and hydrangea. In the village where I live there's even a row of beautiful magnolias grown as a hedge, with pink and white goblet blooms in spring. A hedge can also be a good option in terms of security if you choose plants with prickly leaves such as holly, or thorns such as berberis, pyracantha or hawthorn.

Any time between about November and March is a good time for planting, as long as the ground isn't frozen. Classic hedging plants are often sold bare-root while they are dormant, often at a fraction of the cost of their pot-grown counterparts. Check the recommended spacing of your chosen plants online, or if you buy from a specialist nursery such as Chew Valley Trees, they will be able to provide you with plenty of advice and exactly how many you'll need per metre.

Prepare the ground thoroughly by removing any weeds or grass from the planting area, dig it over and add well-rotted manure or compost, along with some handfuls of bone meal fertiliser. Fork the fertiliser into the soil to make sure it doesn't come into direct contact with the plant roots. Once your hedge is planted, it will benefit from a layer of mulch such as bark chips on the surrounding soil to suppress weeds and conserve moisture. Then, once established, it's a case of keeping it tidy and trimming as necessary during the growing season. This could just be once a year for slower-growing varieties, or two or three times a year for faster-growing plants.

The RHS website (rhs.org.uk/plants/types/hedges/choosing) is a good starting point if you want to narrow down your options. Chew Valley Trees also has an excellent website (chewvalleytrees.co.uk) that will help you choose the right hedge for your garden. n • ellyswellies.co.uk

Plant of the Month: Silver Privet

Silver privet (Ligustrum ovalifolium 'Argenteum') is a great choice for a medium-sized hedge, as it is fast growing and has attractive green leaves edged with silvery cream all year round. It also has creamy-white flowers in summer that are attractive to bees. It's a tough, compact plant that's happy in sun or partial shade and will tolerate most soil types. Trim as necessary during the growing season, but avoid pruning from late summer until spring to avoid frost damage on the new growth. Prune out any shoots that have reverted to plain green to maintain the silver variegation.

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