Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Hedge preservation is vital for our wildlife
Helping hedgerows to flourish in our countryside takes just a few simple steps, reports
AWILDLIFE charity is offering free advice to farmers, land owners and land managers on how to maintain hedgerows throughout the prime management season and beyond.
The People’s Trust for Endangered Species (PTES) says following just six steps will make creating landscapelevel hedgerow management plans much easier this autumn and winter.
The aim is to restore and create a thriving network of healthy hedgerows across the countryside in a bid to ensure the long-term survival and continued health of every UK hedgerow. This not only benefits those working on the land but the myriad native wildlife that call these iconic and hugely important living habitats home too.
The charity’s hedgerow management advice is available via PTES’ free Healthy Hedgerows app. By answering just six questions, the app carries out a quick hedgerow health check and tells users where their hedgerows are within the natural lifecycle. It offers bespoke management recommendations for each hedge and advises which hedges to
prioritise for rejuvenation when creating or adjusting their hedgerow management plans.
Sarah Barnsley, hedgerow officer at PTES, explains: “Autumn and winter are the best times of year to assess the health of a hedgerow. The hedge is dormant, and without its leaves you can see its structure and indicators that might show change is needed. It’s also the perfect time for trimming, coppicing and hedge laying. But knowing what management work to do first, and when, is key to their long-term survival.
“Healthy Hedgerows has been downloaded over 2,000 times and used to health-check over 800 hedges (spanning 108km) since its launch last year. This is a fantastic start, but as there are about 500,000km of hedgerow criss-crossing our countryside much more work is needed. Hedges will only be healthy longterm through careful management which changes over time. We know farmers, landowners and land managers are busy, which is why we’ve produced this app to make hedgerow management as easy and efficient as possible.
“Sadly, about half of the UK’s hedgerows have been lost over the last century through incentivised removal, which makes those that remain even more valuable. We hope our app will help secure a positive future for our hedgerows.”
Hedgerows are countryside icons, and are vital habitats for much of our native wildlife, from hedgehogs and hazel dormice to bats and birds. They are safe navigational corridors, nesting sites and provide food. One study even found 2,000+ species within an 85m stretch of hedge in Devon.
Ms Barnsley added: “Hedgerows are a huge asset to farmers and land managers too. They offer crop protection, and act as stock barriers and livestock shelters. They can provide income and benefit the environment by acting as carbon stores. They help to reduce flooding, soil erosion, air and water pollution levels too.”
To further help the rural community to maintain this precious habitat, PTES offers free training courses. Each is in line with the hedgerow management lifecycle, which is based on the 10-point scale developed by Nigel Adams and HedgeLink.
The Healthy Hedgerows app is available via Apple Store or Google Play. To sign up to a training course, or to find out more, please visit