Today we got a lovely Winter's day - a crisp and frosty start turning into a lovely sunny fresh day. The perfect weather to tackle the fedge. If you have kept an eye on this blog for a bit, you've probably met our fedge before - it's a fence made of living willow - a cross between a fence and a hedge - hence "fedge". Each year, it needs a haircut, because it yields some lovely pole wood, and also wood we can do other things with, like crafts. This year, some of it is also going to be used to create a new willow fedge at Chilwell School, and another one at Nottingham Trent University, which is great - our willow is going places!
Our fedge got some expert treatment from Hassan, who helped to deal with it last year, and has become a dab-hand at tying in the new growth that is bendy and working out which bits to cut out. Essentially, bending over the new bendy wood will make more of the buds sprout to provide a thickened barrier, and lots more new growth. If we don't bend it, then the fedge will quickly grow upwards, making a poor barrier with tall, thin trees.
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| Hassan vs. the fedge. |
Our new recruits Danny and Dan did a great job in cutting out the thicker stems for use in living willow work, and also in making some wreaths with some of the cuttings (which are wonderfully bendy at this stage).
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| Dan decides which stem to cut |
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| Danny working on the fedge |
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| Dan sizes up a stem |
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