CF Stole my hedge

[12FreeRangeEggs]

We live in a naice part of London which thinks it’s the countryside but is actually just a green suburb. To the side and front of my property is our hedge. It’s a mix hedge; Holly, Ivy and other trees. Our Holly has been very good this autumn and we have lots of red berries. I make a door wreath for my front door each Christmas, and I usually forage from my own hedge to make my wreath. So far this year I haven’t gotten around to it but was hoping to make my wreath this weekend.

Well, I returned this afternoon and there was a lady stood on my driveway with a large blue IKEA bag in one hand and a pair of pruners in the other, helping herself to my holly.

I politely challenged her, but she didn’t seem to think that she was doing anything wrong helping herself to my Holly in my hedge. Infact when I protested that I was going to make my own wreath with my own Holly she told me she had a business making Christmas wreaths and usually only made 10 a season despite huge demand because she simply doesn’t have the time but was willing to make a professional wreath for me using my own Holly and charge me £85. I, less politely this time, declined her offer for a professional wreath and asked for my Holly back. She refused and accused me of being bitter and uncharitable.

I think that’s the epitome of entitlement to be honest. Why should the make of car have anything to do with police response time ? Theft is theft.

Invoice her for the Holly. Check if any of your neighbours have security footage. If they do you can take her to small claims court.

That’s what the original poster wrote.

Because that’s what I was written originally. I was replying.

I was merely citing the car that the person who originally posted about the police response time did.

And the Police wouldn’t attend for a hedge having cuttings taken from it. The point being made by the original poster re the Porsche, not me incidentally, I was just replying, was just making the point that if it took 5 days for the police to attend the theft of an expensive car, then what chance has the lady whose hedge was cut have. It’s nothing to do with either the make or value or otherwise of the car. That’s just what you are projecting onto it.

Says nothing about the poster, but does say a hellava lot about you.

"Waves at CF" 😂😂😂

oddly I have and had to decide what level of garden cover I wanted.

That’s theft, you should have called the police nd whatever she’s cut off is your not hers

Then, when you’ve found her, show up to one of her workshops (they all do workshops), and tell everyone about where she gets her materials. You could start off all jolly, ‘oh my gosh small world you’ll never believe where we met recently everyone!’, then stick the knife in.

Well done! But I’m sure she’s in my left you scraps she doesn’t want

however, at least it gave her pause for thought that she’d be found out easily and could escalate causing her embarrassment over something that to her should have been a rotund if foraging in open spaces, not stealing from people’s gardens.

and yes, of course you had every reason to be concerned for anything you grow in your garden

Now that you have your Holly back I'd message her asking if you can attend her workshop. When she asks for payment say ' Oh I thought you were charitable & wouldn't charge as you had my Holly for free'

Imagine if she had popped a lovely fully made up wreath on your doorstep this evening, saying apologies for earlier today, I didn't realise it was your hedge and in future I will I double check before foraging........just imagine if people exercised some actual common decency and did the right thing.
We wouldn't all be on Mumsnet trying to work out what CF meant ???!!!!!

Pupinskipops · 07/12/2024 20:07

It's holly. Practically zero value. It's not a car. It's not a family heirloom. Nobody is getting hurt. There is no permanent damage to property.

Hi, have you got any places left on your wreath making course?

😆

I thought exactly the same thing. Only non-gardeners would think no harm would be caused by ignorantly hacking back a plant - not to mention that the owner may have nurtured the plant and carefully pruned it into a pleasing shape, only to have some thief hack chunks out of it. The CF would have got very short shrift from me.

Except she didn't stop when asked to do so, was stood IN THE FRONT GARDEN OF A HOUSE, offered to make the OP a wreath from the OP's own holly for 85 quid, and excused her behaviour by saying she was running a business. Just imagine if people did the right thing in the first place and didn't go around knowingly stealing.......

The baseball cap man surreptitiously returning the holly is really a good plot twist.