4 out of 5 stars
The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.
After years of grubbing out hedges to make enormous fields for the huge tractors and other farm machinery, it is dawning on people that hedges are the lifeblood of the countryside. The irony is that a man from 2000 years ago could have told them this…
In some parts of the country, the hedge lines can be traced back as far as the Bronze Age and references to hedges are found scattered among lots of documents. Even though these hedges have been around a long time, following the wholesale theft of common land from the people by the aristocracy and the rich, lots more hedges were planted to enclose this land.
It is the underlying geology of the landscape that defines the plants that grow in the hedges in various parts of the country. Some areas are strong on holly, others have hawthorn, and wetter areas of the country you’ll find blackthorn. Because hedges have been part of the fabric of the country for so long, strange tales have permeated from these linear lines into folklore.
Replacing a hedge with a fence is just stupid. A fence absorbs no CO2, it cannot provide oxygen, shelter for stock, doesn’t provide nuts and berries or act as a windbreak and absorb rain. If treated to stop it from rotting, it will pollute the ground with all manner of toxins and will need replacing on a regular basis. A well-maintained and laid hedge can last indefinitely.
There was a formula for dating a hedge: Number of species per 30 yards x 110. It gives a reasonable guideline, but has been largely discredited now. The most accurate way is to look at old maps and trace the field lines and to go out into the landscape to see it for yourself. A survey of the hedges at Underhill Nature Reserve found eight species of trees and shrubs and an astounding 29 other species, five of which are seen as indicators of ancient woodland.
An ideal hedge will contain blackthorn and hawthorn (sometimes known as the Queen of trees), and whatever takes your fancy can be added to the mix. Hart even suggests adding in the non native plant and favours chokeberry because of their fruits.
Native trees support native wildlife, and in some cases, that amounts to hundreds of species. Flailing a hedge will stop it from flowering and fruiting, which is terrible for wildlife and not great for us. If you go back in time, the ancient landscapes were not dense woodland and forest, rather they were scrublands or, as Benedict MacDonald calls it, thornlands – a mix of woodland, scrub and grassland which was constantly changed by large herbivores bundling through it. In other words, a bit like the New Forest is now.
What every hedge needs is a pollard. It is a similar technique to coppicing. But rather than cutting the tree back to ground level, the branches are removed at head height. The effect is the same, though, the tree resprouts again and again. An oak that is pollarded every 50 years will provide wood to build houses and ships, and you still have the tree. A coppice could provide 96 – 180 cubic metres of wood and do this for centuries.
The next best thing to a live tree is a dead tree. Over 600 different insects require dead wood in their lifecycle. A large proportion of ancient hedges can be dead wood, especially where the hedge layer has filled in the gaps with some of the surplus brushwood.
Pretty much every plant in a hedgerow has some other use. Mind you, back then, they couldn’t obliterate the ‘weeds’ with the ultra-toxic chemicals that we now have access to. Some gardening websites claim that it is ‘natural’ to destroy these plants with flamethrowers… Hedgerow plants have often been used for the treatment of various ailments, for example, foxgloves for heart conditions, and so on. There are some really wacky cures out there…
In 2011, a guy called Dr Rob Wolton took a look at his 90m long hedge to see just how many species it contained. It was supposed to be a yearlong project, but he is still going. So far, he has found over 2000 (yes 2000) species in this hedge, and he is still going!
We should remember that we rely on all of these other lifeforms to live, too. The current insect apocalypse that is happening suggests that we have had a 75% drop in insect numbers, with some almost certainly going extinct, some species of which we will never know. This has a knock-on effect up and down the food chain, because if we don’t have pollinators, then we don’t have food to eat. Gone are the thousands of swallows that you’d see in the summer skies.
Hart considers the birds that have come to rely on hedgerows for their survival and expands on how a fully formed hedge can spell the difference between survival and ‘thrival’. As well as birds and insects, a decent hedge will give protection to a number of mammals and other creatures, in particular the hedgehog. I also learned that we used to have a species of tree frog in this country; sadly is a species long gone from the shores.
On top of all the other great benefits that a hedge can give us, it also acts as a year-round larder. There are fresh green leaves in the spring, and a plethora of fruits and berries in the autumn. Plus, numerous plants could be used for medicinal purposes, provided you knew what you were doing… Access to a hedge means you can fill your bottle and plate all year.
Politicians of all hues keep going on about planting trees to help combat climate change. It would help, but it would be good if they got behind planting hedgerows. Oh, and stopped accepting large donations from the oil industry…
Rant aside, rather than planting woodlands, so often done with the wrong trees in the wrong place and using dreadful plastic tree guards, we’d be better off planting and maintaining our hedgerows. They absorb carbon, the wood from them has multiple uses, they shelter crops and stock, stop soil erosion and don’t take up vast swathes of land. In fact, hedges’ ecosystem services outnumber woodlands and meadows. Plus, if coppiced regularly, it can be fairly profitable too.
I really liked this book. Hart is a well-informed and engaging writer, and this book is wide-ranging and interesting, especially when most people would think this is quite a narrow subject. If you are one of those people who think that we are not putting enough time and energy into caring for and planting new hedgerows, then this book would be right up your holloway.
Leave a Reply