Trees planted four years ago at a Coastline estate in Redruth have been turned into a hedge using a method that's hundreds of years old.
Members of our Community Investment Team helped with the transformation at Trenoweth, along with staff from Making Space for Nature, Cormac, Cornwall Wildlife Trust, plus several volunteers.
Over the next three or four years the hedge will become established, and form part of a wildflower meadow planted last year in the same green space.
People from the local Orchard Project were also there - a true team effort and a thoroughly enjoyable and educational event we hear!.
Hedge laying is a countryside skill that has been practised for centuries with regional variations in style and technique. It is the process of partially cutting through and then bending the stems of a line of shrubs or small trees, near ground level, without breaking them, so as to encourage them to produce new growth from the base and create a living ‘stock proof fence’.
Hedge laying developed as a way of containing livestock in fields, particularly after the acts of enclosure which, in England, began in the 16th century. This hedge will help maintain biodiversity-friendly habitats - as well as promoting traditional skills of course.