Pruning and Trimming Perfect Hedges 

It's essential to keep your hedges in good shape! It creates a beautiful and balanced border around your garden. However, if you do not really know what you're doing, it may become quite complicated very quickly. You don't need to worry about a thing because this article will provide you with all the information you require regarding hedge maintenance. In addition to that, we will offer you some helpful pointers on the best way to cut them. The ability of a hedge to serve as a privacy screen and its function of delineating the perimeters of a garden is one of the reasons why hedges are held in such high regard. This makes it less likely that one will be able to see one's neighbours. It is essential to perform routine maintenance on hedges if one wishes to have healthy and vigorous hedges. It is essential to know the optimal period to prune the hedges to get an excellent end result.

Hedge maintenance tasks like trimming, pruning, and shaping can be a lot more labour-intensive and time-consuming than most people realise at first. In addition to being a physically demanding and time-consuming activity, improperly planning or rushing through the trimming process can cause significant harm to your hedges.

A yard can be framed and bordered with the help of hedges, which are often constructed from a large number of bushes that are planted in a very close row. They have the potential to be a wonderful, naturally occurring method of providing solitude, blocking the wind, reducing noise, and adding beauty to an outdoor area. Because they are often evergreen shrubs, which do not lose their leaves or needles throughout the winter, they maintain their attractive appearance throughout the year, are not too dirty and do not require much upkeep. The Laurel, the Golden Leylandi, the Arborvitae, the Emerald Cedar, and the Viburnum are all popular choices for hedging.

The end of winter and the beginning of spring are the two finest times to prune hedges. In Oregon, the best times to prune are in the months of February, March, and May. It is best to prune when plants are dormant and have stopped forming buds. It is not a good idea to prune trees and hedges that are in the process of actively growing. In the summer, hedges put on a lot of growth, and if you prune them at the wrong time or with too much force, it might cause the leaves to turn brown and the tree limbs to die. Nobody wants a hedge that's covered in spots. It would be best if you resisted the urge to trim your hedge at this time since you could cause significant damage by doing so.

The Best Way to Trim a Hedge

It is important to remember that the shoots of the hedgerow should never be entirely severed. Depending on the species of the plant, it is best to prune the new shoots so that they are no longer than one-half or, at the very most, one-third of their original length.

A little taper or trapezoidal shape should be maintained in the cutting of the hedge at all times. This guarantees that even the bottom part of the hedge gets an adequate amount of light and that there will be no bald spots in this region.

In addition, it is advised that the top be trimmed with a little taper since, in that manner, the hedge does not accumulate as much snow during the winter, and hence, there is no snow break. Harry’s Yard offers professional arborist services at an affordable price. We have a team of experienced and qualified arborists who can care for all your tree care needs.

Tools and safety tips 

Spending a little bit more money to get the right tools for the work is an investment that will pay off in the long run. There is a plethora of high-quality handheld scissors and loppers available on the market today, in addition to machines driven by electricity and batteries.

Spend some time thinking about which solution will serve you best. Depending on the requirements of the application, it should also take into consideration how comfortable it is to use.

When trimming hedges, be sure that your eyes and hearing are protected. There is a chance that the machinery will release some of the severed branch fragments.

If you are going to use an electrical hedge trimmer, you should make sure that it is equipped with a circuit breaker and a residual current device (RCD) to safeguard you in the event that you accidentally cut the wire. Working for more than an hour in a row is not a good idea because you may start to feel short of breath and dizzy, particularly if you are working at a high elevation. It might sound silly, but check that your stepladder is sturdy enough for the task at hand, and remember that you should never lean it against a hedge.

When you are pruning your hedge, you should ensure that you have clean and sharp blades so that the hedge does not become bruised or stringy due to the pruning.

When you have completed what you believe to be an adequate amount of cutting on one side of your hedge, use a spring rake to strike against the opposite side. This will cause any folded long shoots to burst out, allowing you to collect them in your subsequent trip in the area.

Instruments that are helpful in the process of hedging.

The following is a list of the equipment that you will require to get started:

• Ladder or scaffolding
• The use of string or rope
• Leaf sweeper
• Hedge trimmer
• Cutters for branches
• Gardening gloves
• Green garbage bag

The various kinds of hedge clippers and trimmers

We are going to go through the various varieties of hedge trimmers that are available to you to assist you in making the selection of the hedge trimmer that will serve your needs the best:

• You have the option of going for a cordless hedge trimmer that is powered by batteries if you do not want to be troubled by any cables and if you want the freedom to roam around.
• If your hedge covers a considerable portion of your land, it is in your best interest to purchase a thermal hedge trimmer, which will provide you with more cutting power. When you are far away from an electricity source, it will give you a great deal of independence.
• The electric hedge trimmer is not only incredibly effective but also very practical for trimming a medium to a big area. Because it is less substantial, it is less difficult to manipulate (between 2 and 6kg). In addition to this, it is less noisy than a thermal hedge trimmer, which is another advantage.

Last but not least, if your hedge is exceptionally tall, there are hedge trimmers that extend telescopically or are placed on poles that enable you to work in a safe from the ground.

If you do not do routine maintenance on your hedge, you will not be able to use a hedge trimmer because thick branches may obstruct it, which presents a potential safety hazard. It is recommended that you use either loppers or branch cutters in this scenario.

When you do decide to prune your hedges, there are several things that you should keep in mind that could help you achieve better results:

• Employ the use of a hedge trimmer. It looks like you're in for some difficulty if you intend to cut your hedgerow with shears and pruners. It's possible that this will work for thinner hedges, but for larger hedges, you'll need something with more muscle. Utilising hedge clippers is the method that is both the quickest and most effective. Try to get one that has a longer reach, particularly if your hedge is taller than you are. It will save you a lot of time (instead of scrambling around on a ladder), and it will make it much simpler for you to take a step back and examine your method to guarantee that the hedge is even.
• Be safe. When you use high-powered equipment like a saw or a hedge trimmer, you put yourself in danger because of the potential for injury. Protect your hands, eyes, and ears with earmuffs, gloves, and eye protection. Additionally, ensure the hedge trimmer is far away from your body and that you have a solid grasp of it. This will ensure that you are not injured in the event that you strike a particularly difficult branch that causes it to bounce back.
• Reduce by a significant amount. If you are going to go to the trouble of trimming and shaping your entire hedge, you owe it to yourself to give yourself a favour and pull the needles and leaves back. If you only give the hedge a quick cut, it will soon start growing back, and you'll have to repeat the process. If you want the shrub to grow on the inside as well as the outside, you need a good quantity of light to be able to go through to the inside of it. It's possible that trimming the hedge's foliage will make it look less attractive for a short period of time, but it will recover fast and begin to appear better in a few weeks.

When is the best time to trim a hedge?

It is recommended that a hedge be pruned twice each year; however, depending on the species and the density of the hedge, it may be pruned up to 3 times per year:

Between the middle of February and the end of March, evergreen hedges such as cypresses, cedars, and boxwoods should have their branches trimmed down before they flower. It is the perfect time to do this because the birds have not started nesting in the bushes yet.

In the late spring, flowering hedges such as viburnum, forsythia, and jasmine need to have their branches clipped. It is essential to allow them to blossom and to wait until the conclusion of the blooming time before pruning them back. During this time of year, it is important to be cautious and steer clear of any bird nests that may be hiding in the bushes.

The end of June or the beginning of July is a good time for a new, lighter cut on hedges because they may flower again in the summer. Take care that the temperature does not get too high, as this could cause the cut regions to get dry and eventually perish.

Last but not least, the end of summer, specifically the latter half of August or the beginning of September, is an excellent time to prune evergreen plants.

Choose the type of your hedge close to your heart

In addition to the trimming, our services include tidying up afterwards and disposing of any generated green trash. Regarding horticulture, our arborists have the knowledge to assist you in going beyond routine upkeep and into the future of your property's ecology.

Deciduous hedges

Preventative pruning is performed in the summer on deciduous hedges to prevent the plants from becoming disorderly. This trimming is done for aesthetic purposes. You can rearrange deciduous shrubs, which are those that lose their leaves in the winter, by pruning them back severely.

When you begin to prune a huge hedge, start at the bottom and work your way up to the top. This is highly significant because it enables a greater amount of light to penetrate the base of the plants.

The hedge will ultimately be trimmed into the shape of an A if we are successful. The base of the hedge will be shaded if you cut upward in a single direction, resulting in a poorer plant at the bottom as the top of the hedge always receives more sunshine nonetheless.

The optimum time to trim beech and hornbeam (Carpinus betulus) hedges is in August or September, as this will improve the appearance of the hedge in the winter and assist the leaves remaining on the branches for a longer period of time. If you want both hedges to continue looking neat and tidy, you should cut them again in February.

To avoid tearing the leaf and causing it to become brown, the majority of people believe that it is better to use pruning clippers or hand shears while working with this type of hedge. You can use whatever tool you like, but you should cut back the new strong shoots at an angle to 2 or 3 leaves from their base.

Boxwood. Buxus belongs to RHS pruning group 8, the early-flowering evergreens, which also includes camellia and Viburnum Tinus as examples of other plants in this category.

When should boxwood be pruned? That's a question that gets a lot of discussions. Some individuals believe that preventing blight from setting on a plain hedge can be accomplished by trimming the tops at an angle of 45 degrees. The excellent thing is that boxwood, like Holly and yew, can recover from bare wood. It will have an unattractive appearance until the following spring, but after that, it will resprout with brand new branches.

Alternatively, you can assist in stopping the spread of any disease by dipping the blades of your shears in bleach that has been diluted.

Hedgerows that have recently been planted and are still young should have their branches chopped back in May to stimulate new growth. When the growth from the new season is about 4 inches long, you should prune it back. It is possible to trim older, more established hedges in the months of May and June, but any unfavourable weather factors, such as blazing heat or late frosts, may harm early growth and make it easier for diseases to spread. As a result of this, it is recommended that you prune them in the months of August or September after any new growth has become more robust.

Bare-root hedging plants

Because of their elongated and slender look, young plants with bare roots are frequently referred to as whips. They frequently produce a thicker hedge because of their stronger ability to intertwine than larger shrubs. They also typically do not have side branches, which makes it simpler to attach a spiral guard on the upright stem to protect the plant from being nibbled by rabbits; you might need to accomplish this until the plants become well-established.

You should consider planting hawthorn if you want a good-looking, unstructured, and wildlife-friendly hedge (Crataegus monogyna). After it has had time to become established, it will produce fragrant white blossoms in the month of May, followed by red berries in the fall that are perfect for feeding birds.

When planting young hedge plants, you need to be harsh with them and trim them back by half to stimulate vigorous regeneration and low branching. Following the cuts that you made, the dormant buds that were underneath them will start to emerge in the spring. Do the same thing again the following winter, but this time reduce it back by fifty per cent.

As is the case with other types of hedges, you should make sure that the base is always wider than the top to get light into the lower branches and guarantee that they remain lush.

Yew from England. When it comes to being pruned, Taxus baccata is a hedge that is quite forgiving. Although they take a long time to mature, English yews produce excellent dense hedges and adapt themselves well to being shaped into topiary.

When planting new hedging plants between the months of October and March, you should prune any side growth that is overgrown. But you must remember not to clip the top growing point, or else your plants will never regain the same vigour and will never grow as tall as they should.

Your hedge should be trimmed in the months of April, July, and October in a tapering form to allow light to reach the base of the plant during its first few years. When it has reached the height you want, let it grow about 4 inches taller than you want it to be, and then you may begin to gradually cut the top down, taking it down a bit at a time.

When you are planting yews, you need to make sure that the soil has good drainage. They cannot withstand being submerged in water and can potentially be sensitive to Phytophthora root rot.

In the early spring, you can give an old yew hedges a makeover by brutally cutting it down to almost ground level, leaving only 6 to 10 inches of height. New growth will emerge, but it might take several hedge years to recover and function normally fully.

Informal flowering hedges

There are several wonderful plants that are suitable for use as hedges.

Examples of evergreen shrubs include escallonia, pyracantha, lavender, and cotoneaster. Other examples include lavender. Most of these plants benefit from cutting their branches after they have flowered or produced fruit.

Pyracantha produces flowers on the growth from the previous year; therefore, when you prune it in the spring after it has flowered, you should make an effort not to cut too much of the growth from the two years prior. Because it possesses pointed thorns, you should protect your hands by using heavy gloves.

It depends on the type of cotoneaster as to when it has to be trimmed, but it makes an excellent wildlife hedge. For instance, after the berries have dropped off of a Cotoneaster franchetii, the plant needs a little bit of mild pruning.

It is preferable to prune Escallonia once it has finished flowering; however, you may maintain it trimmed all year by trimming it on a regular basis. Some varieties of Escallonia grow relatively rapidly and need to be kept under control.

The old wood of a lavender plant does not break apart easily; after some years, some plants may get so woody and leggy that they need to be replaced. After the flowers have fallen in the late summer, the main trimming is done. You can use pruning clippers or hand shears to cut off the old flower stalks, and then you should go back over the plants and trim them back to about an inch, keeping some new exciting growth; you should avoid going into old wood.

In the spring, you should thin out any lanky new growth on deciduous blooming hedging plants like Rosa rugosa. This type of pruning is done.

Forsythia is a plant that ushers in spring and has to be pruned by eliminating stems that flow back to a healthy set of buds to maintain its appearance. You can also try cutting one out of every three stems all the way back to the soil to stimulate the growth of basal shoots.

Evergreen hedges 

Hard pruning is not something that should be done to conifers or Leyland cypresses. Severe pruning will result in the plant having barren brown stems in the centre of the shrub and ugly patches in locations that will, in all likelihood, fail to green up.

The plant known as arborvitae (Thuja), which is also a member of the cypress family, responds well to being pruned and can be used to create dense hedges. The best time to prune an evergreen, however, is in the early spring (March or April), before the initial flush of young shoots appears. This is true for all types of evergreens. When cutting certain conifers, it is important to protect your skin by wearing long sleeves and gloves.

Privet, also known as Ligustrum ovalifolium, can withstand severe pruning. When starting a new hedge, it is advisable to purchase bare-root plants because of how quickly they become established. When immature plants have stabilised themselves and established some roots, prune them back by a third so that they become bushier at the bottom.

Because Prunus laurocerasus, often known as cherry laurel, is such a hardy plant, you can prune it as severely as you like. If you wish your laurel to bloom every year, prune it immediately after it blooms to encourage the growth of buds for the following season. Regarding being pruned, Portugal laurel (P. lusitanica) is also quite forgiving, and it will flower even if you wait until late June to clip it.

In the first and second years, after a freshly planted Leyland cypress (x Cuprocyparis leylandii) hedge has been established, long side shoots should be trimmed back in April and July. This will prevent the hedge from becoming out of control too quickly. You need to make sure that the leader, which is the main stem that dominates the plant, grows up in a straight line.

Continue to cut back the side shoots of the plant until it has reached the height you want it to be. If you want the top of the hedge to be fuller, wait until the spring to prune the leading shoots until the hedge is approximately six inches shorter than the height you want it to be. This will allow the new growth to encourage a larger top.

If you have an established hedge that you wish to trim down, the optimum time to prune it is at the beginning of April before any new leaves appear. To prevent the top from becoming bare and flat, you shouldn't chop off more than a third of the height.

Do not prune any evergreen hedge plants right after planting them. Doing so will only increase the risk of infection entering the wounds before the plant has had enough time to root correctly. This is due to the fact that evergreen hedging plants are not truly in a state of dormancy.

Hedges that are decorative and have a variety of colours. There are numerous types of shrubs with variable foliage that are suitable for use as hedging, some of which include Pittosporum tenuifolium 'Variegatum,' Euonymus fortunei 'Emerald 'n' Gold,' Ilex aquifolium 'Argentea Marginata,' and Cornus alba 'Elegantissima.' When you should prune, your variegated shrubs are determined by the types of shrubs you have.

The hybrid of Photinia and Fraseri The evergreen hedging plant known as 'Red Robin,' which has bright red new leaves, belongs to the category of evergreen hedging plants. Because of this, it is important to prune it not when it is dormant but rather when it is actively growing. It is routinely pruned in the spring and summer months to maintain a tidy hedge shape, as it is valued for the decorative qualities of its foliage. However, it would help if you didn't prune it after the month of August because any new growth would be vulnerable to frost after that point.

Around the month of May is a good time to perform severe pruning on an extremely old Photinia hedge, at which point it should quickly recover and begin producing new leaves.

Summary

Hedge trimming does not require to need a substantial amount of effort as long as you stay on peak of your cutting and prepare better in advance. If you have the right tools and technique, trimming hedges may be a piece of cake; this is certainly relevant if ice-cold beers and a BBQ are waiting for you at the finish of the operation. Why not make it a pleasant experience and make your neighbours green with envy with your magnificent hedge that needs almost no upkeep at all?