Bottom of hedge

[RidingMyBike]

Has anyone tried removing the bottom branches of a hedge? It's a mixture of privet and some kind of cypress.

I'm sure I saw Adam Frost do something similar on GW.

Hedge has neighbour's fence behind it and is very thick at the bottom so it feels like it's taking up a lot of width. But want to retain the top half of it for privacy!

You could certainly take the bottom branches of the privet out, you might even be able to cloud prune the top so it looks more casual and natural. The ‘cypress’ might be more of a problem, most
don’t like being cut into old wood and wnt regrow so you have to be very sure! Also the die back on cypress is often not very attractive, which is why they make a good even hedge. Be aware that unless you have quite a good bed area in front of the barrier, not much will grow as it is very rooty and exhausted ( possibly snowdrops).

Maybe choose thé least conspicuous part and do a short length, leave it for a bit to see how it goes before committing yourself. Oh and make sure you have or hire some decent branch loppers and a pruning saw so you don’t end up with jagged ( and disease prone) cuts.

Bon courage!

Yes, there's no reason why you couldn't do this, but do bear in mind that both those species are very hungry for nutrients and water, so it is unlikely you'd get much to grow underneath. Covering the area with bark would look nice though.

Thank you, interesting responses!

I'd love to rip the hedge out completely and either replace with a mixture of native hedging plants or have a trellis section above the neighbour's fence and grow clematis or similar on it.

But that would be a lot of work, birds use the existing hedge (so we have to be very careful timing-wise with hedge cutting) and we'd have no privacy for a period of time.

We've got a very old, 50+ years privet. It's full of birds, and hedgehogs nest and hibernate in the bottom of it, so I would never prune the bottom. The beds in front are all planted, with shrubs, perennials and roses, it gets dry in the summer, but doesn't seem too much of an issue. There's also a rogue Oak in the middle, it's a great draw for nature.

Oh, and it's 8ft tall, and 5ft wide!!! Bugger to cut. This year DH had to do it three times because of all the rain we had. He grumbles a lot, but we do love it.