An enjoyable workday at Hartsholme Country Park laying a hedge. We don’t get a lot of opportunities to have a go at the traditional country craft, so we were grateful to the wardens at Hartsholme to be asked to help with this project. The hedge was along the track through the park, alongside the wildflower meadow. The stems to be layed, known as pleachers, were not too thick so were fairly easy to cut through with a billhook. 

15 of us set about clearing out the excess material and preparing the hedge. We worked in sections spread along the hedge with the aim of completing a full length of hedge before the end of the day. A few of us had done hedgelaying before so we advised and assisted those who were new to the craft.

By lunchtime we had already layed quite a few of the pleachers and I was increasingly confident we would get our section complete. Being Hartsholme on a Sunday, there were a fair few passers-by, although not too many questions about what we were doing!

By mid afternoon, most of the sections had been completed and deftly layed into the adjacent section, so we stopped there rather than start any new sections. We had completed about 20m of hedge and considering we don’t do this regularly, I thought it looked quite good!. We are planning to return next year to continue on another section and see how our layed sections have faired.
Julian