Cornwall's Hedgerows

From Rev Tomlinson's kitchen window in St. Dominick....we can see miles and miles of nice Cornwall scenery.. in a distance hedgerows look pretty...and they really form good boundaries.

 

A hedge or hedgerow is a line of closely spaced shrubs and tree species, planted and trained in such a way as to form a barrier or to mark the boundary of an area. Hedges used to separate a road from adjoining fields or one field from another, and of sufficient age to incorporate larger trees, are known as hedgerows. It is also a simple form of topiary.

Took this photo from the car while going down a hill......so the pole is a bit slanted...good idea of what a hedgerow is...see those dividers on the road sides....centuries old they are!! I like the contrast - brown and green fields on each side of the road...

The development of hedges over the centuries is preserved in their structure. The first hedges enclosed land for cereal crops during the Neolithic Age (4000–6000 years ago). Prehistoric farms were of about 5 to 10 hectares (12 to 25 acres), with fields about 0.1 hectares (0.25 acres) for hand cultivation. Some hedges date from the Bronze and Iron Ages, 2000–4000 years ago, when traditional pattern of landscape became established. Others were built during the Medieval field rationalisations; more originated in the industrial boom of the 18th and 19th centuries, when heaths and uplands were enclosed.

Many hedgerows separating fields from lanes in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the Low Countries are estimated to have been in existence for more than seven hundred years, originating in the medieval period. The root word of 'hedge' is much older: it appears in the Old English language, in German (Hecke), and Dutch (haag) to mean 'enclosure', as in the name of the Dutch city The Hague, or more formally 's Gravenhage, meaning The Count's hedge. Charles the Bald is recorded as complaining in 864, at a time when most official fortifications were constructed of wooden palisades, that some unauthorized men were constructing haies et fertés – tightly interwoven hedges of hawthorns.

My trip to Cornwall gave me another chance to look at hedges again. Cornwall is rich in historic hedges, with over three-quarters of the hedges remaining today being anciently established. There is even a Cornish Hedge Research and Education Group (CHREG) which is the main body promoting the understanding of Cornish hedges in Cornwall. It is currently a partner in a trans-European project to share the knowledge of traditional skills in hedge and drystone buildings.

A hedgerow may consist of a single species or several, typically mixed at random. In most newly planted British hedgerows, at least 60 percent of the shrubs are hawthorn, blackthorn, and (in the southwest) hazel, alone or in combination. The first two are particularly effective barriers to livestock. Other shrubs and trees used include holly, beech, oak, ash, and willow; the last three can become very tall.