Willow hedges

[Mike]

Does anyone have any experience of planting and growing living willow
hedges. What if any, problems eg. size, maintenance etc.

Regards

Mike

[Robert E A Harvey]

"Mike" <mwhib...@globalnet.co.uk> wrote in message
news:todinnn...@xo.supernews.co.uk...

> Does anyone have any experience of planting and growing living willow
> hedges. What if any, problems eg. size, maintenance etc.

I've never grown a dead hedge of any sort.

Sorry.

Well, in the local woods is a 'sculpture' made of this willow wand stuff,
and it includes a serpentine path fenced in with arches of willow. It
looked good for the first few months, but by the end of the year and in
subsequent years it looked grotesque.

All of the growth was in the form of dead straight upwards wands, maybe up
to 4 foot long, and almost all of it from the highest point on the original
shape. The original archietctural shape was still there, with a sort of
twiggy crown on top. Bizzare.

I suspect it would look fine with a _lot_ of maintainence - you'd have to
cut right back to the foundation shape at least twice a year to stop it
going up and away.

Bob H

[Natalie]

I'm intending to make a Living Willow Tunnel in the playground of the school
I work in. I downloaded the instructions of how to do this from
www.windrushwillow.com

I do know the willow has to be planted during the winter when it is dormant.

Natalie

[Jan]

In article <todinnn...@xo.supernews.co.uk>, Mike
<mwhib...@globalnet.co.uk> writes

My partner was asked to cut down a willow tree that had got out of hand
last year. He cut branches of about three foot in length, approx two
years old and stuck them in the ground in between larger support
branches - older - last November. We now have a lovely fence with
leaves even growing on the old wood and it's about 5 foot high. He
plans to cut it next year and replant the cuttings, again in November.
You can prune annually once established.
If you want to weave a structure using willow you must dry it out &
don't stick it in the ground then use young cut branches to grow up
through the structure to get the leaves etc.
Hope this makes sense.
--
Jan - N. London

[BridgeP]

>Subject: Willow hedges
>From: "Mike" <mwhib...@globalnet.co.uk>
>Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2001 22:45:34 +0100

We planted one this year, about April. No problems with the wands shooting,
only 2/3 have failed. Very pleased with it so far and regard it as one of our
successes.

Peter Bridge