Lopping the tops off conifer hedges

barberboy

Hi,

Does lopping the tops off conifer hedges stunt their growth perminantly or do they need to be regularly lopped?

globalds

Nothing seems to stop them ..
I have two conifer hedges in my garden and go at them with a vengeance............It just seems to make them more determined to out grow my step ladders

peter_the_piper

When pruning conifer hedges always take the central leader down about 6" below the top of where you want to keep the hedge at. This allows the rest of the surrounding stems to grow. You will have to trim them back about twice a year. Remember that very few conifers grow out of brown wood so do not cut too far into the the sides.

barberboy

peter_the_piper wrote: »

When pruning conifer hedges always take the central leader down about 6" below the top of where you want to keep the hedge at. This allows the rest of the surrounding stems to grow. You will have to trim them back about twice a year. Remember that very few conifers grow out of brown wood so do not cut too far into the the sides.

Hi

My neighbour has said this about getting them chopped twice a year, what if they dont, would they just get taller and taller or would grow out the way instead of up?

peter_the_piper

Yes, so far I think Leylands have got up to 90ft and no one knows at what height they stop growing. Any cutting of the leader will slow them down a bit but not for long.

barberboy

peter_the_piper wrote: »

Yes, so far I think Leylands have got up to 90ft and no one knows at what height they stop growing. Any cutting of the leader will slow them down a bit but not for long.

You seem to know your stuff!

Do you know, my neighbours conifer hedges, are blocking a lot of the sunlight out of my garden, unfortunately in Scotland, there is no law protecting us yet like in England but it will be passed in this parliment(before may next year)

I have been told that as we are getting some sun, in the summer time the sun will be a lot higher in the sky and as we have a south facing garden we will get more sun because of the angle of the suns raise, would you agree with this or do you think it wont make much difference?

barberboy

Anybody know about sun angles?

fwor

Yes, it's certainly true that shadows will get shorter and so you will definitely get more light, though IIRC the effect diminishes a bit the further North (in the northern hemisphere) you go.

I know from personal experience that if you chop the tops they just grow outward more vigorously. I've just chopped down about 30m of Leylandii around two sides of my garden and it has transformed it in terms of how much light it gets - even though they were almost all on the N/NW boundary.

Davesnave

Like some dogs, leylandii have a bad press, but the plants are only as bad as their owners. A well trimmed leylandii will not take a huge amount of effort to control. Those that are too big for their surroundings have been allowed to get away. Trimming them then becomes difficult and expensive, so many owners never get around to it. The situation becomes worse...

Enforcing the High Hedges Act is also expensive. Of course what counts as a 'high hedge' is open to misinterpretation. However, where a neighbouring owner is totally unreasonable, there is a remedy which is cheap, almost impossible to detect, and which causes the trees to die. This method involves neat glyphosate weedkiller, an electric drill and a syringe of the sort used by farmers on livestock.

I couldn't possibly tell you any more.....;)

peter_the_piper

Agree with Dave, there are no bad hedges-only bad neighbours. A good leyland hedge can be very neat and a good windbreak and actually needs less maintainence than a normal hedge but needs a bit of work to get it started well then its just a trim once or twice a year. One thing I have noticed with conifer hedges is that if one plant is going to die (and sometimes do for no accountable reason) its always in the middle--never the ends.
I do like the self remedy but suggest that only one is done at a time, looks suss if a lot suddenly keel over, wait till they are on holiday.

Davesnave

peter_the_piper wrote: »

I do like the self remedy but suggest that only one is done at a time, looks suss if a lot suddenly keel over, wait till they are on holiday.

I've never done it, but I came very close when a neighbour planted 6 Castewellan Gold right in front of the sunshine in my first garden. I had about 24'x18' and he had 1/4 acre, but he still saw nothing wrong with planting something that would take much of my light.

They were only about 8' high when I moved, ironically right next door to the old neighbour, so now I had contol of the sunlight! The trees carried on growing and it was only when they were well past the upstairs windows of my old house that I heard there'd been complaints. They were lopped at that point, but remained at around 16'-18', which is where they are to this day. My old garden is still very dark.:(

Had I stayed, I wouldn't have hesitated in that situation from killing the trees. He could suspect what he liked; proving anything would have been impossible.

Incidentally, I planted my own leylandii in that garden, 20' north from the gardens of people I was gaining privacy from, and casting shade to suit some of my own plants, Shade can be valuable too, but it's easy to have it all when you can play with 1/4 acre.