Woven chestnut fencing

This is a new style for the farm: and I’m not sure it’s working.  Woven chestnut fencing.  Tricky to get right.

I had to put something here: there was no proper full stop between the hornbeam hedge and the grass. I usually just put one large fat log of chestnut to delineate the different uses of the garden.

But this is a very long curving wall of plant. And I just couldn’t find one or three logs that would do the trick.

hedgebeforeSo I turned to Nicolas and asked him to go hunting in the forest for the right material.

And he came back with not three but a dozen smaller logs and had a go at weaving. (Around reinforced steel rods normally used in concrete pouring, in case you are curious.)

It looks fetching under snow.

And I think it will be fine when I get more soil into the bank behind the woven wood.  And mulched.

snowyhedgeAnd when the plants green up in spring it might all be fine.

Or maybe I’m reluctant to embrace this as it’s such a sorry tale of the flood damage when the whole gorgeous stone wall fell down.

Here is a reminder.

starting plum bank

005 (2)And in one morning it was gone.

david and wall

cleared wallOnce I was back at square one, I planted this massive hornbeam hedge. And placed a zillion thin chestnut sticks to try and hide the dreadful raw looking bank behind.

thatch That was to distract the eye until the shrubs grew.

mulchedhedgeAnd they have done very well. Apart from four which died on the far right end of the hedge.

I need to go down to the Vachon plant nursery on the Rhone and get a few more.

Later this week perhaps.

hedgebuiltIt will grow on me.

And part of me thinks; get over it. It’s just gardening. And try and think back to the way it was before there was any hedge. Or low wall.  Hardly the ‘welcome to the garden’ sight.

eroded wall 2