Laurel hedge with fruit trees?
Kieren1980
Posts: 17
Hi all,
We moved into our house last year, between the paddock and house/garden it has a very overgrown leylandii hedge which i'm slowly taking down, presumably it used to be a windbreak but the lower branches are now bare and it doesn't do much other than block out the sun!
However we are in a windy spot so at the top end i've replace the laylandii which a mixed hedge of blackthorn, rose, beech etc. At the bottom end I was thinking of some laurel but it seems a shame not to use that space to put some small fruit trees that don't mind the wind, I was thinking Czar plum and an apple of some kind. Would it look odd to have a laurel hedge with a couple of trees mixed in? Would it work?
Thanks! I'm a keen but not particularly experienced gardener....
Posts
To be honest I think it would just look odd. Laurel are such big green leathery evergreen things and fruit trees are twiggy and deciduous. And the laurels would steal the nutrients and the fruit trees would be starved. More blackthorn and a couple of crab apples would be a better balance. Even a few hazels.
If you live in Derbyshire, as I do.
Yes, where I live it is usual to include hazel, crabapple, wild cherry and wayfarer trees in 'natural' hedging. It looks well, especially if the hedge is layed (spelling?) as it matures. I have a windy site and fruit trees don't grow well at all.
Hmm yes, to be honest thats what I thought, it's just that the natural hedging will take longer to perform as a windbreak. Back to the drawing board!
Is there not enough space to have the fruit trees in front of the Laurel?
I wouldn't touch laurel with a bargepole. It can get enormous...,
will take loads of nutrients and water from the plants you really want and needs to be pruned with secateurs rather than cut with shears to avoid cutting leaves which would then go brown and look horrible.
Hazel and hornbeam are a bit quicker than hawthorn etc., but it may be worth waiting. I'll come and lay it for you in three years.
how about a medlar? pretty flowers in the spring and fruit in the late autumn, you can keep it pruned to stop it getting too big, or you can extend the native hedge planting up to it and have it as an emerging tree from the hedge line.