When is a hedge more than a weekend job?
Most hedges start as a neat line of shrubs. Ten years later, some are a wall of trees. The usual tipping point is height: if you'd have to leave the ground to reach the top, it's time for someone with the gear.
Other signs: it's growing into the power line to the house, pushing a fence over, hanging over the footpath, or dying back in patches. Councils notice footpaths. Wodonga's local law says hedges mustn't overhang a road or council land lower than 2.5 metres above the footpath or nature strip.
In NSW, the law has its own idea of a hedge. For neighbour disputes, Legal Aid NSW says it's two or more trees over 2.5 metres high planted together to form a hedge, and bamboo counts as a tree.
What does an arborist do with a hedge?
There are four kinds of hedge job. A trim keeps the shape you have. A reduction brings an overgrown hedge back down in height or width. A renovation cuts hard into an old, bare hedge so it regrows from lower down, if the species will take it. A removal takes out the plants, stumps and roots.
The plant decides a lot. Lilly pillies are forgiving: the Australian Native Plants Society says Syzygium smithii responds well to pruning and makes a tall hedge, and compact forms such as 'Hedgemaster' stay around 1 to 1.5 metres. Bottlebrush is fussier. The Australian National Botanic Gardens prunes it lightly just behind the flowers as they finish, into the new season's wood, and not just before winter.
Some old hedges are weeds. African olive was introduced in the 1800s partly as a hedging plant and is now a weed in NSW, so replacing it may beat reshaping it. Our olive tree and bamboo pages go further.
What makes a hedge job bigger or smaller?
Height, length and neglect. A maintenance trim is quick. Taking a metre off a tall hedge that's been left for years is real work, and the clippings can fill a truck.
Both sides. If the far face is on a neighbour's land, someone needs their say-so to get in. Legal Aid NSW says you need your neighbour's permission to go onto their land to prune, and in Victoria you need their consent.
For a removal, what's below ground. Stumps can be ground out (see stump grinding), and roots along a fence line often run close to pipes and cables.
Power lines. A hedge grown into the service line changes who can do the work.
Is the hedge touching a power line?
Don't trim any part of a hedge that's touching or growing into a power line, including the service line to the house. Keep tools well away and call the electricity network, or an arborist the network authorises to work near its lines. Our trees and power lines guide covers who clears what in each state.
Can council rules cover a hedge?
Yes, sometimes. Councils mostly write rules about trees, and a hedge of trees is still trees. Some name hedges outright: Bayside's Significant Tree Register lists rows and hedges as well as single trees, and cutting, trimming or pruning a listed one needs a local law permit. Boroondara's definition of a significant tree can include a hedge.
Removal is the case to check hardest, because taking out a row of established plants can mean removing several protected trees at once. Ask the council before anything is cut, starting from our tree removal permits pages.
My neighbour's hedge blocks my light. What can I do?
In NSW there's a set process. Under the Trees (Disputes Between Neighbours) Act 2006, the Land and Environment Court can deal with hedges severely obstructing sunlight to a window of a house, or a view from it. Only the owner or occupier of the land next door can apply.
Legal Aid NSW suggests talking to your neighbour first, and getting a shade diagram from an expert before you apply. The court also has to be satisfied you've tried to sort it out, and it calls mediation effective. Other states treat hedges and light differently, so outside NSW start with our neighbours' trees guide.
Hedge trimming: what you can do yourself
You can
- Trim a low hedge with hand shears or secateurs, standing on the ground.
- Lightly prune a bottlebrush hedge just after it flowers, into the new growth.
- Cut out dead stems at any time of year.
- Talk to your neighbour before any work on a shared hedge.
Leave to an arborist
- Anything you can't reach with both feet on the ground.
- A hard reduction of a tall, overgrown hedge.
- Any hedge near a power line.
- Removal, stump grinding and roots.
Questions to ask before you book a hedge job
- How much height and width comes off, and will it regrow from there?
- Will any cuts go back into bare wood, and does this plant recover from that?
- Is now the right time of year for this species?
- What happens to the clippings?
- Is the neighbour's side included, and who's asking them?
- Who checks the council rules and the power line?
Hiring an arborist for hedge trimming
Little and often beats a big hack every few years. Keep a low hedge trimmed from the ground yourself, and bring an arborist in once it's above reach or anywhere near a line. If a neighbour's hedge is the problem, we'd talk to them before anything else, because the NSW court wants to see that you tried.