Hedge. The selection of plants. Landing. Care. ^Favorite

Each owner wants to protect their possessions from noise, dust, immodest looks and uninvited guests. The hedge on the site will be the ideal solution for such cases. In addition to barrage functions, it can also serve as an element of decor for a garden or a summer residence. Yes, and will cost less than a capital fence.

 

What are the varieties of hedges

The answer depends on how exactly you want to see your summer cottage.

Want her to grow as quickly as possible? Pick fast growing plants.

Do you like to work with green spaces, cut them, shape, care for them? Stop on the hedge formed.

If there is no time and desire to constantly take care of how this hedge looks, moreover, the area of ​​the site is quite extensive, you should prefer a hedge that grows freely. It will only be necessary to trim it slightly, removing old, faded shoots or those that are too much knocked out of the general row.

From the desire of the owner to protect the summer cottage from dust, noise, strong wind, etc. it depends on how many rows a hedge will have - one or more. In the first case, the living fence will change externally every season, conifers - evergreens.

There are hedges, among other things, in height. They can be:

• Very small - no more than half a meter
• Low - maximum meter high
• Average height - 1 - 1.5 meters
• High - about two meters
• Very tall - above the height of a person, up to 3 meters and above

 

Choosing a variety of hedges, you can think about whether you need a prickly hedge or just decorative, for beauty. Although the prickly hedges are also very beautiful.

In general, there are many different classification options for hedges. For each species, only certain plants may be ideally suited. Although there are among them the so-called "generalists" who feel normal and look in many versions of green fences.

Selection of plants for hedges

Choosing the right plants is very important, so you should prepare for this process.. Be sure to take into account the selected type of hedge and its purpose. There are some general rules and patterns that should not be ignored when growing hedges.

• If you need to beautifully arrange the border of a flower bed, lawn, or garden paths, for example, then flowers - one-and biennials like marigolds or medunica, undersized shrubs like pygmy spirea are the best suited for this. Spiky such living borders usually do not.
• According to tradition, a low hedge about a meter high is also not prickly; for it, for example, golden currants or western thuja are used. If you want to still make a prickly hedge of this height, we plant a rose hip or barberry.
• A hedge up to two meters high may consist of yellow acacia or privet, cotoneaster, honeysuckle, and vesicle. Spruce - Siberian, eastern, ordinary, Siberian fir, western thuja is suitable for a hedge. All of them can have different heights, which can be used to achieve this or that effect.
• A very high living fence will be made of trees - a round-leaved berry, for example, or a berry apple tree, field or Tatar maple. Siberian fir, cherry plum, spruce, juniper are also suitable.
• If the fence should be high, but at the same time there is a desire to form it, it is better to choose tall plants that tolerate pruning well. Suitable in this case are leafy oak, varieties of spruce, arborvitae or fir.

 

There are many more different rules and principles for selecting plants. Only the most common of them are listed, in each case they can change. And there are a lot of suitable plants. Having picked up the most suitable for yourself, you can proceed to the actual construction of a living fence.

Planting a hedge

Whatever plants the hedge consisted of, the main stages of its creation are approximately the following:

1. Digging a trench. To do this, we tie a rope to two pointed pegs, which will serve as a guide when digging a trench. Or, if desired, individual pits with a depth of about one bayonet shovel, up to a meter wide, depending on which plants will be planted.
2. Carefully loosen the bottom of the pits or trenches.
3. The topsoil - usually it is especially fertile - is poured to the bottom. Manure and humus are also used for this.
4. In each hole we put a handful of mineral fertilizers. If this is a trench, then fertilizer is poured through about a meter. Approximately this distance should be between the seedlings. The indication is purely indicative, the distance is purely individual for each breed of plant.
5. Add some water to the pits or into the trench and wait until it is absorbed.
6. After removing the damaged roots, if any, we plant the plants and fill the pit with soil, lightly ram it.
7. We cut the third part of the height of the planted plants, if they are deciduous. Conifers are better treated with some kind of drug that reduces evaporation. This will allow them to take root better and faster.

 

On this, the planting process can be considered complete - it remains only to monitor how our hedge grows and take care of it.

Hedge Care

Leaving consists mainly in watering, top dressing, trimming hedges. Moreover, some plants like high humidity, some prefer to be watered a little, but often, while others sometimes like to get a large portion of water. Others, on the contrary, cannot tolerate waterlogging. But while the hedge continues to grow, it should be regularly watered. The soil is previously loosened, water is poured out to the base of the plants and impregnates the soil 30 to 40 centimeters.

The green fence should be fed in spring and autumn. Peat, humus, compost are applied per square meter 2 - 5 kg. Mineral is applied by season: nitrogen only in spring, phosphate only in autumn or late summer.

After a year, they begin to trim, do it about 4 times, from spring to the end of summer. In subsequent years, the haircut will depend on the species of plants and on the type of hedge. Formed hedges are trimmed more often, moreover, if it is done by a specialist. Especially if a complex shape is chosen. Free-growing hedges require the removal of old branches or sticking out non-standard shoots, that is, simply sanitary pruning.

To form plants when cutting, you should try in the form of a cone with the tip up - so the lower branches will receive more light.

Features of individual plant breeds

Each plant has its own characteristics that must be considered, including these plants in the hedge.. Sometimes they can be used to create the necessary visual effects. Let us dwell on the characteristics of some of them.

Thuja

This unusual tree has several varieties with completely different qualities. Some consider this plant ideal for hedges. Thuja varieties are found, reaching 4 meters in height, there are also undersized ones - up to one and a half meters. The shape of the crown can also be different - pyramidal or spherical.

Spruce

A very beautiful, dense and almost impenetrable hedge emerges from the spruce. This tree also has many varieties, very different in height. Requires a periodic haircut.

Willow

The willow fence is reliable and durable, which means that it can also act as a real fence.This plant is unpretentious, well takes root, the hedge from it is not expensive and does not require special care for itself.

Hawthorn

The plant is very hardy, unpretentious, tolerates frosty winters and dry summers equally well. It forms shoots for 150 years, a powerful root system can occur at a depth of several meters, so young plants should be planted, up to 5 years old.

Barberry

It is used for prickly hedges, requires regular haircuts. Without this, the hedge looks messy. But its spines serve as a guarantee of protection against any uninvited guests.