I love a hedge, and I've been thinking a lot about them recently! There are several ancient hedges at Tymawr-Farm in a poor state (sometimes only evidenced by a few knarly old thorn trees every 4 or 5 metres), and also several post-and-rail fences with no adjacent hedge at all. Long term I would like to rehabilitate the former and create a great new hedge in the latter.
A hedge is a wonderful thing, a great example of how everything on the farm should be in due course:
- Permanent: with minimal maintenance.
- Intensive: creating a large amount and diversity of products in a small space. Eventually I need to make £5,000 per acre net profit and I can't afford for fences just to be barriers!
- Multi-purpose: providing a stock-proof barrier, berries and nuts, firewood, timber, wildlife, bee and game habitat, a windbreak and hopefully longer term truffles (see later).
- Metal-free: in the medium and long term metal will be too valuable to be used for any applications other than tools and machines. We plan to get used to inevitabilities sooner rather than later! (We understand that we'll have to temporarily fence using stock fence and barbed wire, but that can be recycled longer term!)
My first project is a 100m fence running North-South, currently post-and-rail. The land slopes gently from East to West. The cross-section will look like this (modelled on Sepp Holzer's raised beds):
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| Hedge 'mound' cross-section |
Hawthorn
Blackthorn
Elder
Hazel
Holly
Oak (every 20 metres or so)
I would like the Hazel and Oak to be 'infected' (if that's the right description) with Summer Truffle, and hopefully look forward to a delicious and productive crop as well as high quality charcoal, beanpoles and timber! I've been following the fortunes of www.plantationsystems.com/home for a while since I saw an article on them in the Telegraph a few years ago. A clever system and a nice chap seemingly.
