ON PLANTING AND REARING THORN HEDGES. 



39 



whenever the moss is divested of mois- 

 ture, they become stunted and soon die, 

 unless means are taken to supply that ne- 

 cessary nourishment. 



In order to make a fence at once suffi- 

 cient to turn cattle, the author directs that 

 a trench five or six feet wide, and three or 

 four feet deep, be dug, and not only the 

 earth taken from it^ but a considerable 

 quantity of turf dug up on the other side, 

 and the whole formed into a dyke several 

 feet high, tapering narrow at the top; and 

 the thorns, have a sufficient degree of 

 moisture, for a long time after they are 

 put in, but as the dyke is raised high, the 

 water will not run to the roots, unless 

 there be a trench at the back part, which 

 should be kept open five, or six years, 

 . and sometimes this proves ineffectual. It is 

 .recommended therefore to make but a 

 moderate trench in front of the dyke, and 

 not lo raise the top of the dyke too high, 

 to exclude the sun from the roots of the 

 thorns; and though this may require ad- 

 ditional fencing to guard it at first, yet 

 it will] become much the more secure 

 fence in the course of years. 



The notion of thorns or any other plant 

 being killed when their roots reach the 

 cold sub-soil, is treated as a mere conceit; 

 since nature has taught plants where to 

 strike their roots in search of the most 

 nutricious food, and if every plant died 

 when its roots reached the sterile sub-soil, 

 none would be found alive after a few 

 years. But it is not in clay soils says Mr. 

 Alton, or where the sub-soil is a cold clay, 

 that thorns die soonest: but that happens 

 much more frequently in dry sandy, or 

 gravelly soil, or in dry rocky parts, where 

 there is no cold soil of clay within reach 

 of the roots; and the failures in growth 

 which are supposed to proceed from the 

 roots reaching a cold sub-soil, proceed 

 nine times out often from want of mois- 

 ture. 



It is also noticed thai hedges are seldom 

 dressed in a proper shape, being either 

 permitted to rise like trees, and their 

 bushy tops to overshadow and kill the 

 smaller branches near the roots, or else 

 having the lower branches lopped off, in 

 order to straighten the hedge, while the 

 tops are allowed to remain. To prevent 

 this, it is directed that the hedge after it 

 rises three or four feet high, be kept, thin 



at top in form of a wedge and the lateral 

 twigs allowed to spread out near the 

 ground, to the breadth of eighteen inches 

 or two feet, and the hedge tapered on both 

 sides. And when this is done, the heat, 

 light dews, and rains fall upon the parts of 

 the hedge equally, and the thorns grow 

 as close at the root as at the top. 



Observations. These remarks may ap- 

 pear trivial to some of our readers, but 

 many thorn hedges have failed for want 

 of proper attention to the planting and 

 rearing them. And it is an important part 

 of agriculture, to obtain fences at once 

 fully adequate for the separation of cattle, 

 and affording shelter from storms. — Re- 

 trospect. 



Remarks of the Editor Observer and 

 Record. 

 If the white thorn require more mois- 

 ture than other plants, or if all kinds of 

 plants employed in forming live fences 

 require more than what falls in rain im- 

 mediately around them, (and I have no 

 reason to doubt it) a question arises what 

 is the hQsi general method to furnish a 

 supply necessary for the hedge at all times. 

 It is suggested that a trench be excavated 

 two feet wide, and two feet deep, and 

 that one half of tliis trench be filled with 

 the upper half of earth that has been re- 

 moved in forming it, (where this is a 

 grass sod, let it be reversed) the operation 

 may be performed in the following man- 

 ner; first dig the earth from the trench for 

 any convenient distance, say three feet, 

 and throw it upon the bank; then dig the 

 upper half of the next three feet; and 

 throw it into the bottom of the part first 

 formed, with the top reversed, which will 

 bury such seeds and grass as may be at 

 the surface so deep as to prevent them in 

 some degree from growing and thereby 

 injuring the young hedge, in this way 

 proceed in preparing the ground the 

 whole distance for the intended hedge; 

 the lower half of earth removed from the 

 trencli, may be deposited where most con- 

 venient, so as not to interfere with future 

 cultivation. The young plants from the 

 nursery are to be planted in a row at the 

 middle of the trench, and cultivated with 

 a hoe. The land upon each side of the 

 hedge while in cultivation during the time 



