Sibe,

I moved house recently and there is a hedge growing across the middle of the garden. It breaks the garden in half and I want to remove it. Is there an easy way to do this as my husband and I know nothing about gardening?

Thank you,

M Brennan

Our gardening expert replies:

Hi M Brennan,

I would think carefully before removing this hedge completely. People don't often plant hedges across the middle of gardens and there may be a good reason why this one was put in. If your garden is reasonably large it could well have been added for design purposes. A great deal of interest can be added to a flat garden by including barriers so that you cannot see all of the garden from any one point. You may not be into gardening now, but if you become interested in changing the design of your garden, adding a hedge, a trellis or shrub border may be something to consider.

I would suggest that you wait a little while before taking any action - in any event, removing a hedge in summer would be more of a pleasant task than tackling it now. The other possibility is to take out just part of the hedge - this may ease your access to the bottom half but would still give you a partial barrier.

As far as tackling this is concerned, assuming the hedge is, say, Privet or Beech, firstly, cut off the top growth tackling small pieces at a time by using a pruning saw with care - these are very sharp. If the hedge plants have stout stems, leave the thickest in place at about 3' high to use as levers to remove the roots. If the stems are not thick you may as well cut down to ground level. The job would then be made a little easier if you wait a few months to let the roots weaken and to throw up new shoots, which you can remove as they appear.

Then it is a case of starting at one end, maybe 18" away from the hedge and digging inwards with a sharp spade, slicing off the root system as you go, until you get towards the base of the hedge. It would be an advantage to get all the pieces of root out of the ground as these will only rot down in future years, providing a food supply for mushrooms and toadstools. These will not cause any harm, and aid the rotting process, but you may wish to avoid them. When you get near to the base of the plant and you've dug all the way round, use the top as a lever to break the final roots.

Dig over the area and let it settle before deciding what to do next. If you intend grassing over the gap you will need to obtain extra topsoil and to consolidate the area thoroughly so that you can walk over it without causing impressions in the soil. Let this area settle again until you are sure it is at the right level to either sow grass seed or to add turf.

If you bring in new turf or sow grass seed you would have a band of different coloured grass across the middle of your garden. What I suggest you do, therefore, is to choose another out of the way area of your lawn which has decent grass growing and then, by using a sharp spade, cut out pieces of turf to move into the new position. Ensure these are at a uniform thickness so the area ends up level. You can then either use the newly dug area as a flower bed or a turf or sow there where the new grass will not be as noticeable

Good luck.
Sibe