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| Down the hedge laying line. Photo: Dave Edwards |
On Saturday 4th February, the Wirral Countryside Volunteers (WCV) held their 17th Cheshire style free hedge laying course. It was a great success; it was a complete sell out with twenty-two trainees, fourteen trainers and four essential support volunteers. These essential support volunteers helped with directing parking, making and distributing the tea and homemade cakes, as well as taking the emergency contact details of attendees and keeping the site tidy by gathering over 400 tree guard spirals and their supporting bamboo canes from when the hedge was planted. The bamboo canes will be recycled into bug houses during wildlife projects with local schools.
WCV used the Eventbrite platform for booking. The event was oversubscribed and there was also a waiting list. A week prior to the training event an email prompt was sent to the booked participants to check if they were coming and if they could not make it to cancel their tickets to make space for others. This resulted in a few dropouts and created space for all those on our waiting list to join. It was well worth sending the confirmation email. The 16th training event had eight no-shows on the day! This time only one no show. The event was limited by the length of hedge available for the group to lay on that day.
There was a broad range of ages including a granddaughter who came with her grandmother, Liverpool John Moores University Conservation Society students, couples, fathers with sons and daughters, as well as people with pony paddocks. The participants came from Wirral and beyond from Flintshire, Denbighshire and as far afield as Sedbergh, Cumbria. Asking what had sparked their interest in hedge laying, one trainee said he’d seen it on Countryfile over Christmas.
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| A young hedge layer with passers-by on the public footpath. Photo: Dave Edwards |
The hedge was at Wood Park Farm, Neston, a commercial dairy farm run by the University of Liverpool for research and veterinary training purposes. It was a young hedge with 5cm diameter stems and nearly two and a half metres in height making a perfect beginners hedge. There was not much brash to remove just a little siding up. Prior to the event the hedge was broken into 13 lengths, with the first two pleachers laid off, so, at the beginning of the training day there was an obvious starting point for each length, which enabled everyone to get started into the hedge laying quickly. The hedge was adjacent to a public footpath and the passers-by were complementary about the hedge laying. Arnold Plumley, a local judge from the Cheshire Ploughing and Hedge Cutting Society, came along to give the trainees and trainers pointers to improve their hedge laying techniques. Arnold was impressed with the number of cutters and the quality of the hedge laying.
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| Hedge laying under Arnold's watchful eye. Photo: Paul Loughnane |
Participants were sent an online feedback survey to complete to know what went well for them and what could be improved. All of the comments were positive. One declared, ”I thoroughly enjoyed the day, from arrival to finish you were made to feel welcome. All the trainers were friendly and approachable. I was fortunate to have Aidan as my trainer who was immensely helpful and knowledgeable. The training was hands on which I believe is the best way to learn. The lunch break where tea and cake were provided gave the opportunity to speak to both trainers and trainees. There was a good cross section of trainees: male, female, young, old etc. It was my first attempt at hedge laying and I was pleased with the outcome. It was a great day out, don’t know how to improve it.“
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| Wirral Countryside Volunteer Aiden teaching a hedge laying trainee. Photo: Dave Edwards |
A second enthused, “Very impressed with the provision of tea, cake and appropriate tools. Excellent directions to get to the venue. The student/teacher ratio (2:1) was far better than expected and therefore the ability to put in to practice was not encumbered.”
Thanks go to John Cameron, the Farm Manager and his team in the transporting of tools and stakes to the hedge and dealing with the brash.
In the Cheshire Ploughing and Hedge Cutting Match September 2022, a third of the cutters came from the WCV. One trainee from the WCV 15th training day in November 2019, Philip Pullen from the Isle of Man, joined three of the WCV in the National Match at Wallingford, Oxfordshire in October 2022 as a competitor in the Cheshire Class. So, these training days are delivering results for hedge laying both locally and nationally, with several eager new hedge layers keen for the 2023/24 season to start.
