Hedge Trimming in Junortoun, From Windbreaks to Garden Hedges

Nobody plants a 60 m hedge on a rural-living block for looks alone. Out here a hedge is a windbreak, a dust and noise screen from the McIvor Highway, or the thing that stops the neighbours' headlights sweeping the lounge room. Hedge trimming in Junortoun is about keeping those plants dense, at the right height and alive, and cypress, lilly pilly, photinia, pittosporum and viburnum each want slightly different handling.

Common hedge problems on Junortoun blocks, and what we do about them

• The cypress windbreak has gone leggy and bare at the bottom. Cypress will not regrow from bare wood, so we take the height down to a level that still carries green foliage, which lets light back to the lower branches and stops the row getting worse. Rows already bare to head height are candidates for replacement a plant at a time.
• The lilly pilly screen along the frontage is twice the height it was meant to be. Lilly pilly takes hard cutting well, so we reduce it to the intended height and width in one go, ideally in spring, and it thickens up again over a season.
• The photinia is thin underneath with all the red growth on top. Photinia shoots from old wood, so a hard reduction on the top and sides in early spring, then two lighter trims through the growing season, brings the density back down the plant.
• The pittosporum screen has holes where plants have died. Usually waterlogging or drought stress on the heavy clay east of Bendigo. We trim the survivors to push them sideways and advise on replanting the gaps with the same species.
• Nobody can reach the top any more. Windbreaks and screens at four or five metres are cut from a platform or with pole gear so the top is level and the sides slope slightly inward to keep the base in light.
• An old privet or hawthorn hedge from the farm days. These can be cut back hard, but privet in particular is a weed around Bendigo, and we will say if removal and replanting is the better long-term answer. Where the plants have become trees, that is covered on tree removal in Junortoun.

When to trim what

The general rule for hedge trimming around Bendigo is to avoid hard cutting in the heat of midsummer, when exposed inner growth scorches, and in the depths of a frosty winter for the tender species. Junortoun's summer northerlies and cold, wet winter clay push those windows a little later than they would be in town.

A typical hedge day here

A property near the BIG4 end of the highway has a 45 m Leyland cypress windbreak along the north boundary that has crept up to seven metres and gone thin at the base, and a lilly pilly hedge around the house yard a metre higher than the owner wants. The windbreak comes down to about four and a half metres, cut to green growth, with the sides lightly faced; the lilly pilly is reduced to the agreed height with a straight top and sloped sides. All the clippings are chipped into a mulch pile for the orchard. A full day for two, and the block gets its view back without losing its shelter. We do the same over the boundary, described on hedge trimming in Strathfieldsaye, and for the older gardens in town on hedge trimming in Bendigo.

Conditions that shape hedges in Junortoun

The blocks are big and the hedges long, so a trim is measured in tens of metres rather than a few plants. The soils are the heavy clays and gravelly rises of the box-ironbark country, which hold water in winter and bake in summer; pittosporum and some conifers sulk in the wet spots. Fire is the other consideration: conifer windbreaks are high-fuel plants, and inside the Bushfire Management Overlay that applies to parts of the suburb, hedge height and closeness to the house are worth a conversation with us and a check with the City of Greater Bendigo. Where a hedge has grown into a row of trees, tree lopping in Junortoun explains what a proper height reduction looks like; the main hedge trimming service page for Bendigo covers formal versus informal hedging, and our Junortoun suburb page covers everything else we do on the acreage.

Hedge and windbreak questions from Junortoun