HEDGE. 



HEDGE. 



The method which I recommend for planting 

 forest trees generally in hedgerows, but more 

 particularly oaks, is as follows : Let the quick- 

 sets be laid in, and the bank finished in the 

 usual way; then select good transplanted trees 

 of 2 or 3 years' growth, fresh drawn from the 

 nursery. The broken roots and tips of the long 

 fibres may be cut off; then push the spade 

 down perpendicularly into the bank between 

 the roots of the quicksets ; press the spade 

 from side to side, so as to make a cleft open- 

 ing, into which put the root of the plant as 

 deep as it had before stood in the nursery ; 

 tread the earth firm to the root, and face the 

 bank up, as before : leave the tops of forest- 

 tree plants uncut at the time of planting, unless 

 when they are bushy-headed, and without 

 leaders or 'top-shoots ; in that case a few of the 

 larger side shoots may be cut in, that is, the ex- 

 tremities of the branches shortened. It is a 

 most pernicious practice to cut the tops of 

 young forest trees at the time of planting, and 

 should only be adopted in particular cases. 

 "The time most proper for planting hedgerow 

 trees and quicksets is autumn, or early in 

 spring; and the work should never be delayed 

 till late in spring, if it can be avoided. But 

 when (from necessity) trees are planted late 

 in spring, and the ground dry at the time, the 

 roots of the plants should not only be kept moist 

 before planting, but they should also be dipped 

 into some earthy sludge at the time they are 

 planted. 



" Training of hedgerow trees is seldom or 

 never thought of; and I will now add, when 

 pruning is practised, it is generally performed 

 in a very injudicious manner. Young hedge- 

 row trees seldom require much attention in 

 training until the hedge is cut the first time ; the 

 trees should then be examined ; if they appear 

 crooked, stunted, and unthrifty, they should be 

 cut off close to the face of the bank in the same 

 manner as the thorn plants are. The oak 

 stubs may be expected to throw up several 

 strong shoots from each plant in the following 

 season ; and in a year or two afterwards, the 

 best young shoot on such stub should be se- 

 lected to remain, and all the others be slipped, 

 or cut off close to the stub ; the reserved shoot, 

 or (as they may be called) regenerated plants, 

 may then be expected to become timber trees. 

 "When an unthrifty young tree is to be cut 

 off, as here recommended, particular attention 

 should be paid to the method of cutting. The 

 stroke from the workman's bill-hook orhatchet 

 should always be v.ptrards, or from the stub, and 

 never downwards, or to the stub; whenever the 

 latter practice is followed, the stub is left shat- 

 tered, the wet penetrates through the clefts into 

 the stool, or crown of the roots, canker is pro- 

 duced, and the tree rots. No good timber can 

 be expected to grow from diseased roots. 



"There may be said to be four different sorts 

 or methods of pruning now in practice ; these 

 I designate under the styles or titles of first, 

 natural pruning; second, close pruning; third, 

 snag pruning; and fourth, cutting in, or fore- 

 shortening. The three latter more immediately 

 apply to hedgerow trees ; but I will review the 

 four, and in this review I wish fir trees to be 

 understood as excepted. 



"The best of all pruning is what I call na- 

 ural. This is effected in woods and plant- 

 ings where trees stand thick: there the tops 

 of the trees unite ; they draw one another up ; 

 light and air is excluded from the lower 

 branches, and those, consequently, dwindle 

 away ; the stems of the trees grow up straight 

 and tall; and they gather proportionate 

 strength, from the top branches extending, 

 when the planting is thinned out gradually (as 

 all plantations of trees ought to be). This re- 

 mark is also applicable to hedgerow trees, in 

 their infant state, when they are drawn up and 

 nourished by the thorn bushes. But when 

 trees stand singly, they throw out strong side 

 branches, and their boles or stems seldom rise 

 to much height, or attain to much cubic mea- 

 sure, unless the side branches are either crop- 

 ped by cattle (which is a species of pruning), 

 or are cut off by the hand of man. Hence 

 arises the diversity of opinion with respect to 

 the most proper method of obtaining the de- 

 sired object, by the assistance of art, when na- 

 ture ceases to operate in the matter wished for. 



" Close pruning answers to a certain extent. 

 The operation is performed by cutting the side 

 branches off close to the bole of the tree, when 

 it is expected that the bark and the timber will 

 heal over the wound and become united. If 

 this operation is completed when the branches 

 are young, or mere saplings, the tree in a 

 vigorous growing state, and a few only of the 

 branches cut off in one season, the object will be 

 obtained, without injuring the growth of the 

 tree. But the system, from having been mis- 

 understood, has been misapplied, and carried 

 to an alarming extent, doing incalculable in- 

 jury, not only to individuals, but to the country 

 at large. Immense numbers of large boughs 

 have been amputated from the trunks of trees, 

 in the ram hope of the timber growing over the 

 wounds, and uniting with the stumps of the 

 boughs left in the body of the tree ; the bark 

 and sap-wood does indeed sometimes grow 

 over such wounds, but the stumps of the 

 branches enclosed go to decay, become a canker 

 in the bole of the tree, and the result is calami- 

 tous. It is the ready extension of the bark 

 over the wounds in trees which has been the 

 means of misleading so many people ; be- 

 cause, as they see that the bark unites, they 

 take it for granted that the woody fibres does 

 so also ; and so, in fact, the growing part of 

 the tree will do, but the stump of the ampu- 

 tated arm becomes a dead substance, and can- 

 not unite with a living one. On the whole, it 

 is a dangerous practice to cut large boughs 

 close to the stems of trees, particularly old and 

 unthrifty trees. Young thriving trees will suc- 

 ceed, if close pruned, to a certain extent; but 

 old, stunted, or full-grown trees, never. 



"Snag pruning is a very pernicious practice ; 

 it is performed by cutting the boughs off seve- 

 ral inches from the bole or stem of the tree. In 

 old trees, those stumps act as conductors for 

 wet into the body of the tree ; in young trees 

 the bark of the stubs throw out young shoots, 

 which nourish for a time, but te heart- wood 

 of those stumps decays, and has a similar effect 

 to the stumps of boughs 'in old trees, which do 

 not throw out young shoots. 



611 



