3rd September 2019 Wet + hedge clipping.

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Tuesday 3rd September 55F, wet and windy. Continuous rain expected to last until lunchtime. As it says on the tin: Wet! She made me do it! I was sent off during a microsecond's delay between downpours. To become thoroughly drenched from head to toe before reaching my familiar exit to the lanes.

Every lorry provided additional moisture. Just in case there was anywhere left which I'd somehow missed myself. I'm taking a bit of a chance and keeping my socks on. All the rest has gone into the wash. With a thorough pre-rinse, at no extra expense, in either water or electricity bills. Have I gone self-sufficient or off-grid? One can only hope.

Wednesday 4th 60F, heavy overcast and breezy. We kept hearing a racket yesterday afternoon but couldn't see anything. Today I spotted a hedging tractor, way off, across the fields. So I used that as my target for today's walk.

They have a huge and equally noisy, branch chipping machine too. To eat up all the fallen foliage. The noise is a small price to pay for keeping the field hedges. All too many have been lost in the past. Often roadside hedges too. Which cyclists greatly value for their protection from the wind and driven rain. They hold back the snow drifts from the fields too. Often only gaps in the hedges cause snowdrifts on the roads.

These hedges are favourite nesting spaces for birds. Perhaps they sense that they offer greater safety from predators. Which might be deterred by the traffic movement and noise.

The hedge clipper uses a long, thin, spinning cutter. Rather than the typical domestic, scissor action or a large, circular saw. Very sharp the cutter is too judging by the quality of cuts of felled branches and stumps left on the hedge itself. Not much debris spread.

The debris falls onto the field at the foot of the hedge and is then chipped later by the other machine following on behind. All highly efficient. With clipping carried out at a good walking pace. With regular interruptions as the cutter chews noisily through thicker branches. Even the chips have value and are piled up in vast mounds for later collection. Presumably for suitable heating systems. Or garden bed coverage to deny light to the weeds.

I wouldn't mind the tractor clipper having a go at the overgrown hedges around Chez Hovel. They trimmed back the neighbour's field hedge one year but didn't lower the height. So it just went on growing [and growing.] It's not my hedge so I'm not allowed to cut it any lower. None of the rotation of neighbours have touched a hedge in over 20 years. While I have been scrambling up 15' ladders every year to trim shared hedges myself.

There is supposed to be a 2.2m maximum [shared] hedge height but nobody cares out in the countryside. Once a hedge gets away it is no longer just twigs for loppers and domestic hedge clippers. It develops massive trunks and branches. They are all horribly spiny, plums, cherries, elders and Hawthorns. The blackbirds eat the fruits and then crap all over the place in colour. You can probably tell that I haven't been allowed out for a ride again. 😒

Click on any image for an enlargement.

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