My willow 'fedge' (cross between a fence and a hedge) is finished!! With advice from Stuart Anderson willow guru extrodinaire who has more varieties of willow in his garden than you can shake a stick at, I set to and did it!! I used a green willow 'viminalis' and a red willow called just 'hybrid red' all from the Somerset levels local to us. The spare rods have been planted in the willow bed at the soakaway end of our septic tank sewage system where they will help with purifying the water, and drinking lots of it as willow is very thirsty!
Now I just have to hope all the rods 'take' and survive!! The pics are of my fedge in the garden and of the path looking down the garden past the fedge and my newly laid bit of ash hedge towards the ducks with fields and woods beyond.
6 comments:
Hi Val!
Your Willow Guru I might be but it's only fair that I should credit my Willow Guru: Steve Pickup of The Willow Bank where you can go on courses and buy kits and rods.
I like the design of your fedge and arch but I have just one observation. You've broken one of Steve's "Golden Rules" which is that the rods must not dip below the vertical, so you may find the tips that bend down will die off.
I look forward to seeing some photos during the summer, when it has leafed up and you've covered the necessary but ugly black mulch mat in woodchip; well done!
Hello Stuart & Gabrielle!
Thanks for that very useful observation!! I am going to alter the arch accordingly a bit so I have none going down....I had a feeling that might be wrong but was not quite sure!! The bits on the 'decorative arty bit' in the 2 sides I thought would not survive as sap does not go down hill, but thought "what the heck its prettier than cutting them off!!!"
I have a problem about covering the mulch matwith bark, although it would look lovely.....my chickens love going in the garden to look for edibles and would rake the bark all over the place! I am thinking of mulching with some soggy brown fleeces that I have hanging around as mulch.....what do you think?
What a small world! I popped over here from the forum and see my old pal HHH, Irene in France is in your blogroll!
Hope the weather is not being too wild down there.
Dx
Hello Mrs Nesbit!!!
Oh yes it is a very small world ;-))
Bit wild and windy up here on our hills
Val x
Cracked it! As you know, Val, our own chickens are free-range and we have the same problem as you, with permaculture mulch routinely scattered everywhere by hungry and inquisitive chickens. We've just created a rose garden with a chamomile path in between and, in order to keep them pesky chickens out of the way, and prevent the veritable Annick's thirty or so half-wild cats from digging it up just to have a poop, we've covered it with a fine plastic mesh bought from Interhatch. You can hardly see it, it prevents the problems, and will be re-useable once it's done it's job.
Maybe "cracked it" wasn't the phrase to use: sorry to hear about your knee, get well soon!
Great minds think alike!! Before my little accident I raided the tent and took some metal tent pegs and stole the pea netting from the shed and did exactly the same.......must remember to get some more tent pegs before the tent is used again!
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