Agri Vehicles Insurance from Greenlands

Author Topic: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)  (Read 6793 times)

SallyintNorth

  • Joined Feb 2011
  • Cornwall
  • Rarely short of an opinion but I mean well
    • Trelay Cohousing Community
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #15 on: November 21, 2019, 06:08:30 pm »
When we were doing our woodlands, our local ecologist said we’d get a better result for less work and around the same money by planting more densely and not bothering with guards.  Some will get chewed, but the density compensates and enough survive, and no plastic waste - and if you’re using whips or the next stage up, just make a slit in the ground and heel them in, that’s it. :idea:
Don't listen to the money men - they know the price of everything and the value of nothing

Live in a cohousing community with small farm for our own use.  Dairy cows (rearing their own calves for beef), pigs, sheep for meat and fleece, ducks and hens for eggs, veg and fruit growing

Anke

  • Joined Dec 2009
  • St Boswells, Scottish Borders
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #16 on: November 21, 2019, 07:08:32 pm »
Sadly the local rabbit and vole population is just waiting..., so it will be plastic tubes and a chicken wire fence properly angled down on the outside...

arobwk

  • Joined Nov 2015
  • Kernow: where 2nd-home owners rule !
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #17 on: November 21, 2019, 07:27:45 pm »
Sadly the local rabbit and vole population is just waiting..., so it will be plastic tubes and a chicken wire fence properly angled down on the outside...

Guards and a fence ??  Are you sure you need the fence as well (providing use tubes of a decent height - say 600mm)?

« Last Edit: November 21, 2019, 07:30:19 pm by arobwk »

Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #18 on: November 22, 2019, 12:00:00 am »
Sadly the local rabbit and vole population is just waiting..., so it will be plastic tubes and a chicken wire fence properly angled down on the outside...

Guards and a fence ??  Are you sure you need the fence as well (providing use tubes of a decent height - say 600mm)?


Tubes, fence, cats, pet kestrels, buzzards, owls, Gatling gun...then you might keep away the voles, rabbits, deer, geese, sheep and goats.
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

There is NO planet B - what are YOU doing to save our home?

Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

Anke

  • Joined Dec 2009
  • St Boswells, Scottish Borders
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #19 on: November 22, 2019, 11:32:25 am »
Sadly the local rabbit and vole population is just waiting..., so it will be plastic tubes and a chicken wire fence properly angled down on the outside...

Guards and a fence ??  Are you sure you need the fence as well (providing use tubes of a decent height - say 600mm)?


Tubes, fence, cats, pet kestrels, buzzards, owls, Gatling gun...then you might keep away the voles, rabbits, deer, geese, sheep and goats.
It is a straight line, so we will be able to put in a chicken wire fence easily, it won't need proper fence posts etc. If needed we can also run a wire of electric at deer height.

arobwk

  • Joined Nov 2015
  • Kernow: where 2nd-home owners rule !
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #20 on: November 22, 2019, 07:09:14 pm »
It is a straight line, so we will be able to put in a chicken wire fence easily, it won't need proper fence posts etc. If needed we can also run a wire of electric at deer height.

I am one for (sometimes) ignoring given wisdoms and doing what sounds right to me.  However, I would offer the thought that electric fencing is not considered a great deterent for deer (due to their hairs being hollow). 

There are plenty of rabbits and visiting Roe deer on my land and, for a temporary rabbit/deer fence, I once installed rabbit netting, with a ground-level out-turn, fixed to 1.8m bamboo canes and then I strung fishing line in, I think it was, 3 rows between the canes above the netting.  Deer do not like coming up against stuff they cannot see and get spooked apparently by the fishing line.  All I can say about this solution is that the willows I'd planted were not nibbled by deer (or rabbits) over 12 months:  they were, however, nibbled by field voles!
To note that farmers tend not to bother with the out-turn when temporarily protecting their new brassica plantings against rabbits (in particular) with netting and canes.


If you have excluded deer and rabbits (and any livestock you might have) from the planting area then you only need shorter vole guards which, someone here pointed out to me, are best 'sunk' into the ground a bit. 
I will bet, however, that "vole guards" are a premium price item compared to "standard" tree guards. 
I expect it would be cheaper to buy "standard" tree guards and cut them into shorter lengths (if one really needs to be frugal and/or can be bothered - to note, though, that they do get slightly brittle over time and old ones do not like being cut - I've tried). 
« Last Edit: November 22, 2019, 07:52:32 pm by arobwk »

Penninehillbilly

  • Joined Sep 2011
  • West Yorks
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #21 on: November 22, 2019, 08:40:50 pm »
When our trees were planted they twisted the spirals/guards into the ground, or voles can almost flatten themselves to get underneath.
Neighbour lost a few good sized willow through values, also deer like rubbing their heads on them broke some down.

Fleecewife

  • Joined May 2010
  • South Lanarkshire
    • ScotHebs
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #22 on: November 23, 2019, 01:27:20 am »
A problem we had one year was with snow.  The snow was so deep that rabbits could sit on it and nibble away at the bark, because the whole of the tree guards were buried.  We lost several trees that way, including a wonderful oak  :rant:
"Let's not talk about what we can do, but do what we can"

There is NO planet B - what are YOU doing to save our home?

Do something today that your future self will thank you for - plant a tree

 Love your soil - it's the lifeblood of your land.

Anke

  • Joined Dec 2009
  • St Boswells, Scottish Borders
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #23 on: November 23, 2019, 11:22:45 am »
A problem we had one year was with snow.  The snow was so deep that rabbits could sit on it and nibble away at the bark, because the whole of the tree guards were buried.  We lost several trees that way, including a wonderful oak  :rant:
Yep, winter of 2009/10 - fortunately our apple trees were quite small then and in large tree tubes. But they did get to the willow we had just started - it did re-sprout.

Penninehillbilly

  • Joined Sep 2011
  • West Yorks
Re: Hedging - hornbeam vs beech (Scotland)
« Reply #24 on: November 25, 2019, 10:40:15 pm »
Rabbits killed a few of ours off one year, lost a few hollies, thought it was more recent but could have been then, and snowdrift meant rabbits were ringing the trees at drift level,

 

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