Best trees to plant

[Fishlegs]

We’ve recently moved and have a couple of large leylandii along the back fence. We are having them removed, along with a huge cheese plant (I think).

I’d like to plant a couple of native trees instead that would be good for birds and insect life, and thought of hawthorns, but everyone I’ve mentioned this to has expressed horror at the idea. Would hawthorns be so bad? Any other ideas of suitable trees? It’s a smallish suburban garden so I don’t want anything massive. Thanks

Hazel, hawthorn, hornbeam and blackthorn are all good hedge trees. And blackthorn would give you sloes to make sloe gin!

Rowan (mountain ash) trees aren't too large, come in many varieties of berry colour, and have good autumn colour too. Birds love the berries!

Thanks, lots to look at and think about

I have cotoneaster trees in my garden. One with red berries and one with yellow. They might not be native but the visiting redwings who travel south at this time of year from Scandinavia scoff all the berries.
Reading the info online they grow to 6 m which sounds a lot but I see that hawthorns can grow to 15 m. They are 30 years old and look stunning, covered with berries. So you could try one but they are slow to grow.
www.ashridgetrees.co.uk/tree-cotoneaster-watereri-cornubia

I’ve got a gorgeous mountain ash that is beautiful in spring, ok in summer, gorgeous in n with red leaves and glowin* orange berries that the birds love.

I’d also have a delicate flowering cherry, not great for birds eating but you can hand bird feeders from it.

Elderflower is good for birds too and crab apple.

You could always go to a decent nursery and ask advice.

I agree with all the above I would just say that after removing the leylandii (we have had a number removed too) you need to enrich the soil with good non peat compost before planting new trees because they rob the soil of goodness, also they acidify it (which is great if you need extra acid , but not if you don't of course!)

I would leave the cheese plant, trim it first of course, because it climbs and adds interest while your new trees are growing.

From the Telegraph
Crataegus persimilis 'Prunifolia’ is a compact hawthorn with rounded deciduous leaves that turn red and orange in autumn. It bears numerous if short-lived red fruits and masses of white spring flowers (18ft x 12ft, 6m x 4m).

You could plant a wildlife hedge and just keep it trimmed to whatever height you want. Good time to plant bare root plants now.

Just be aware that depending on light levels, these things will take a long time to give you the type of coverage you've been used to. Plus you're not going to get year round greenery. We planted our British natives hedgerow eight years ago. Its still really spindly.

I've got a hawthorn, blackthorn and rose hedge that is looking very substantial now and takes quite a lot of trimming. Takes me a good day to trim it twice a year. It's long though, but bear that in mind and it's thorny which is a bugger. It's about 10 years old.

I'd put in trees personally so you haven't go the same upkeep as a hedge and can underplant it.

Yes kjhk Have you been trimming the tops of your 'spindly' trees? they respond well to a bit of a trim.

Or Fish fruit trees grow quite quickly. They seem to 'force' them into fruit bearing, because ours had a good crop in the first year and not much later, though they've grown fast.

I have the same problem, we are also planning in removing a hedge of leylandii, and after much deliberation I have decided on columnar yews. They are evergreen so the garden will have a backdrop that always have colour and leaves to screen.

Love a mountain ash though, beautiful. Also look at the ginko’s, spectacular autumn colour but I’m not sure they’re suitable for hedging, just a lovely tree to look at .

Hawthorns are splendid trees! How could anyone react with horror to them?

a huge cheese plant Cheese plant is usually Monstera -an indoor plant if you're in the UK. Is the name "cheese plant" given to an outdoor plant as well?

Rowan - stick to orange/ red berries for the birds, they don't recognise the white ones as edible. And the white/pink/yellow ones aren't native.

Crataegus persimilis isn't native. Crataegus monogyna is our native one. You probably need to decide whether native is most important to you, or whether you can relax that condition provided the tree is good for wildlife.

In the rare years where we have a waxwing influx round here they go for guelder rose (actually a Viburnum). People talk about them liking rowan, but the rowan berries are always long gone but the time the waxwings arrive.

If you want something evergreen, try a holly - make sure you have a female tree (trees with male flowers don't give berries) and you may be rewarded by mistle thrushes or even redwings.

Yes kjhk Have you been trimming the tops of your 'spindly' trees? they respond well to a bit of a trim.

They do get trimmed but I think the biggest issue is that they don't get as much light as they would like and so they reach upwards rather than bush outwards. The rose does well, hawthorn and blackthorn not as well.

Just to throw in that when you get the stumps ground out it might be worth digging in a lo

..oops. A load of soil or compost as the leylandii will have stripped the soil (we took out 10 and dug in two tonne bags of mushroom compost. Gave the new tress a good start and made planting very easy

Is the cheese plant actually a fatsia japonica - plant with big hand shaped green shiny leaves? It can be pruned if it is.

We have inherited a hedge, lots of Hawthorne. Yes the bids love it but it isn't child friendly. The spikes are nasty and ended up in a&e sorting out my daughter's foot as a tiny bit of spine got in and went nasty. If no children go for it the flowers are lovely.

The spikes are nasty They also seem to have the property that the deader they get, the tougher they get. Don't let any hedge trimmings fall on to any ground that you may be weeding!

How about a spindle tree?

www.ornamental-trees.co.uk/euonymus-europaeus-p20/s15882?utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=euonymus-europaeus-apos-red-cascade-apos-form-single-stem-tree-sup-form-single-stem-tree-supplied-size-150-200cm-root-type-10l-pot&utm_campaign=froogle&gclid=Cj0KCQiAt_PuBRDcARIsAMNlBdqcYFf5e4vsIKZACm_IdiBZaZHexvHrBYx5xgoGuQWfeyoo3ueKEMoaAgkUEALw_wcB

We have recently added a mulberry tree. The fruits are delicious. Thinking about a fruiting cherry next.

You could go for a pyracantha. Vicious thorns, but a mountain of flowers in June which is a lifesaver for bees (June is a thin time for nectar) and then a gorgeous red/orange feast for incoming migrant blackbirds in November. Great plant. Very sad we have to execute ours, it is lovely, but too close to the house for its size.

Thanks everyone.

We have a pyrocanthus adjacent to the gap now left by the leylandii. I didn’t think so much of it until I saw the flowers last spring, they were breathtakingly beautiful.

We do have kids in the garden frequently - mine and lots of their friends over, thinking of one of them being stabbed by a hawthorn spike isn’t good.

Liking the idea of a mountain ash tree, and the suggestion of fruit trees, maybe we could get a couple of plum trees? That back fence is south facing so gets a lot of sun.

Also tempted by sloe berries from blackthorn, but are the thorns as hazardous as hawthorns’?

Pyracantha is far more vicious than hawthorn or black thorn imo!

Plum is stunning, I had a massive old one in my last garden, but I got SO fed up of picking up the fallen fruit every August. They were very poor quality so no point harvesting, but too thick on the ground to be left to rot.