HANDY HEDGING

Brian is getting creative when it comes to dealing with setting up boundaries in the garden

Whenever I can, I always like to use plants as solutions to gardening problems – especially when needing to create division and define boundaries. Don’t get me wrong, you can get some beautifully constructed walls perfect for tucking plants in such as you would find in an alpine garden, or up and on that of a walled garden where warmer micro climates are created allowing us to grow crops more successfully.

For me, though, I just love a good hedge. They have so many uses in the garden. They help to separate our own garden from the neighbour’s and provide screening to give us a little privacy.

In design they can be used to divide our garden into little rooms, helping to create the impression our outdoor space is larger than it is.

If you wish to attract birds then, in my eyes, there can’t be anything better than a hedge. I have seen the results myself after adding a beech hedge to mark the boundary of my garden.

We now watch robins, great and blue tits and others using this for cover before making their way to the feeders outside our sitting room window.

I suspect choosing a wall or a fence over a living hedge is to avoid the regular maintenance that comes with them.

The initial cost may be high and if they don’t collapse or fall down then they certainly do provide a low-maintenance simple solution.

I know I’m biased, but a once-a-year trim isn’t the end of the world. If it helps nature and keeps me fit and active in the process then happy days.

To ensure hedges don’t become a burden, I would say it’s important to have the correct plant choice – a statement that applies everywhere in the garden.

There’s a good variety of plants available that can be used for hedging over and above the often-seen and ever-reliable yew, beech and privet.

For years, I always thought privet, or it’s Latin name Ligustrum ovalifolium, was the only type of hedge you could get, being all that there was in the post-war housing where I first grew up.

Being tolerant to most types of soils and its ability to make a solid mass quickly made it a popular choice, though nowadays not ideal for time-starved gardeners due to it requiring to be trimmed at least twice during the growing season to keep it in check.

Sadly, I can’t see myself ever choosing this shrub today as a hedging choice, but I’ll always think of it fondly as part of my childhood, though probably not for the right reasons.

When I was younger and feeling brave, I would join my mates in a game of “hedgy” where we would use the tough privet hedges in the back gardens of Chamberlain Street as our version of the Grand National, starting at one end running through the gardens jumping over the hedges.

This is certainly not something I would condone my own children doing and I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to those garden owners, but it was great fun!

Now I’m a poacher-turned-gamekeeper, knowing exactly what tricks I need to look out for, keeping my own hedge 6ft tall to deter any similar high jinks from the youth of today.

I also know I wouldn’t even had dreamed of attempting such a thing if those hedges had instead been either of holly, hawthorn or berberis, which have foliage and branches of spines and thorns.

These are ideal for security and you may also see them strategically placed by frustrated head gardeners in parks and gardens as a deterrent to visitors from taking shortcuts!

There is a hedging plant for every situation. Fuchsia and two plants from New Zealand, brachyglottis and griselinia, are great for gardens in coastal situations as they are able to tolerate salty winds from the sea.

Ribes sanguineum and cultivars of Potentilla fruticosa can make attractive and unusual flowering hedges as can the rose R. canina which, combined with hazel, rowan and blackthorn are also ideal for encouraging wildlife.

Despite our best efforts to keep them tidily trimmed and within their allotted space, it’s fairly inevitable they will eventually grow wider than we wish, encroaching borders and paths thus making them tricky to pass.

When this is the case, a touch of hard pruning is required, now being the best time to take some action to renovate deciduous hedges and waiting until mid-spring before tackling evergreens.

As always, please make sure you do some research on what kind of hedge you have.

The mercury had dropped below zero and the wind had a ferocious bite, but within minutes of leaving the car I knew this was going to be a good day out. As I made my way along the iron-hard track, I had company: two birds of prey, effortlessly circling overhead, dark silhouettes against the burgeoning light breaking over the landscape.

They vanished as quickly as they had appeared, but the mood had been set. Their silent elegance was an instant tonic, a good omen for this walk.

I was heading for the rounded hill of Manywee and a circuit which would bring me back along part of an old and largely forgotten section of a drove road which linked Glen Moy and Glen Clova.

Glen Moy is one of the quieter Angus glens but it offers a wide range of options over a range of rolling hills which can be linked in many different combinations.

The small parking area on the west side of the stone bridge just below the farm of Glenmoy was the starting point. A few steps north, and I took the track on the left which curved round to the steading ruins of Glencuilt.

I ignored track branches left and then right – many of these are recent additions and not marked on older maps – sticking to the main drag which continued across the lower slopes of Craigthran before twisting upwards. There are two tops, both sitting just off the track, the second being the higher. When the track started to swing down to the right, I left it, keeping straight on for the short but pathless push to the substantial cairn on Manywee.

This meant crossing a double line of wire fencing, but there was no real problem. The fence is a handy guide for the drop south-west over fairly rough heather and boulder ground. A small wooden shooting hut is passed on the rise to the Tops of Fichell.

The route continued gently south over the imperceptible rise of The Aud to reach a col and a metal gate to the right. This is the point where you can shorten the walk: staying with the main track will take you back to Glencuilt, saving about five kilometres, a bit of ascent and a couple of hours.

The drove road lay down to the right at Gella Farm, so I dropped east on the new track, then skirted the farm to continue south. This once busy right of way was heavily waterlogged in places, a mudbath in others, churned up by farm traffic and cattle. Further on, there were signs of an older passage, the remains of a grassy track.

Underfoot conditions did improve slightly. The track passed the former Girlguiding outdoor centre at Brocklas and ran alongside a plantation before emerging at Kinrive.

The route continued round the farm buildings where I turned left on to a minor road. Just before a bridge linking to the Glen Moy road, I went through a metal gate to follow a path marked on the map allegedly heading north by the river.

I soon realised this path may have been a work of the imagination. There were lines through the vegetation but these were more likely caused by many feet trying to find a path. The easier option was to scale the short embankment to the left and stay high, keeping to the edge of the plantation.

I abandoned my search for the path and crossed the stream above the junction with the Burn of Glenmoye to take a direct line over soft ground to emerge on the incoming track just a few minutes from the bridge.

ROUTE

drystone wall and a gentler, 1

Head N from parking left to Glencuilt ruin.

2

Ignore left turn, then right and follow track N then NE to twin tops of Craigthran. 3

Leave track as it starts to swing right to drop N over pathless terrain for short rise to Manywee, crossing fence to reach summit cairn.

4

Leave cairn and head SW by fence, dropping to col then rising again over Tops of Fichell.

5

Drop to pick up track coming in from left which continues S over The Aud until reaching gate on right at col (those wishing shorter day can stay on main track which leads back to Glencuilt).

6

Go through gate and to farm at Gella.

7

Turn left and take track running S from farm, passing house at Brocklas, to reach Kinrive and follow round farm buildings to reach minor road.

8

Head N for short distance and just before bridge, go through metal farm gate and head N.

9

After crossing stream, take direct line NE over open ground to reach initial track short distance from parking. and take follow track track on down

Alan Rowan is a well-known author and walker. You can follow his regular mountain adventures at munromoonwalker.com

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Volunteers working as a team to keep the hedges in shape at Scone Palace.

TOWERING ATTRACTIONS: The 70ft tall beech hedges at Meikleour.

View from the top, left, and approaching the summit cairn of Manywee.

LANDSCAPE: Ruins of the former steading at Glencuilt.