Restoring an old beech hedge

11/11/2025

Over a period of 3 years, you make three quite hard prunings.

In the winter of the first year, cut one of the vertical faces of the hedge almost back to the trunks at the centre of the hedge, leaving short stubs of the main lateral branches: most of the regrowth will come from these stubs, so don't cut them flush with the trunk. New growth will burst by May.
The following winter, remove the top of the hedge, cutting down to about 9 inches below your desired finished height. Again, it will look sad until May!
In the winter of the third year, remove the other vertical face of the hedge in the same way you did the first.

By spreading such radical pruning over 3 years, the shock is not too severe and plants recover beautifully. The biggest beech hedge reduction I have seen was from 6m tall by 3m wide down to about 1.5 metres tall by 90cm wide, and it looked good by the end of May or early June every year throughout the process.

Comments (17)

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Dave Nicholson 11 years ago

Very interesting article – Thanks. Dave
Shuva Dey 2 years ago

Hi,

I purchased six copper beech hedges from you in December last year. They are just coming in to bud very very slowly. I notice the leaves coming through are green in colour on of them. Could this be case of been sent a common beech? I will see what the other colours are that are coming through.

Thanks.
Alison 4 years ago

Wondering if you could offer any advice on leaf blotching that has occurred on a well established mature tree? There are small pale roundish marks with dark reddish black bleeding colour from the centre to the leaf margins.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated thank you,
Regards
Alison
Simon James 4 years ago

I have a Beech Hedge, the plants are about a metre apart, which has been allowed to grow wild – it is now nearly 4M High and becoming a nuisance can I cut it back/down and if so by how much? I would like it to be no more than approx 2.5M high. Any advice welcome. Incidentally I now live in Norfolk but used to visit Ashridge regularly as I lived in Hemel Hempstead for 25 years until 2014.
Susan sands 5 years ago

I have a great deal of ivy growing on my copper beech hedge..if I prune it will the beech it has grown over survive…also can you give me any tips on how to prune it !
Many thanks