How Often You Should be Trimming Hedges

Hedges play a crucial role in shaping the overall appearance of your garden. Beyond their aesthetic appeal, they serve a variety of practical purposes including defining property boundaries and acting as a natural habitat for wildlife and insects in your yard. Keeping your hedges in tip-top shape requires semi-regular maintenance, and understanding what this entails is the key to having healthy, polished hedges.

Hedge Trimming Essentials

Whether your goal is to maintain precise shapes or simply encourage healthy growth, knowing when and why to prune and trim is essential. Here, we’ll explore some of the factors that influence hedge-trimming schedules, including growth and seasonal considerations.

Why trim hedges?

Why do hedges need trimming? There are a couple of important reasons why this task should be a regular part of your garden maintenance routine:

• Maintain Shape: Trimming keeps hedges in shape, making it easier to achieve and maintain your desired garden aesthetic. Gradual shaping throughout the year is much easier than taming overgrown hedges.
• Promote Health: Regular trims can help you to identify and rectify any other issues with your plants, whether that’s dying or dead branches that need removing, or pest issues that require treatment.
• Encourage Growth: Trimming stimulates new, denser growth, resulting in healthier and more robust plants.

Once your hedges are established, incorporating regular trimming into your garden care routine is crucial for their long-term health and appearance. Regular maintenance can range depending on how avid of a green thumb you are, the type of hedges you’re growing and seasonal impacts.

How often to trim hedges

For both deciduous and evergreen hedges, you should aim to trim them yourself, or bring in hedge trimming services, twice each year. While their trimming schedules are similar, the reasons differ. Understanding the rationale behind their needs is an important part of maintaining them.

Evergreen trees and hedges are quick growers, and can get out of control if left untended for long periods of time. Trimming twice a year gives you the opportunity to remove new growth while it’s still manageable, which also encourages a denser, more compact plant overall.

Deciduous hedges require biannual trimming as they have two key growth stages. Taking care of maintenance in alignment with these periods will ensure your deciduous hedges have the best chance at growing exactly how you want them to. These key stages are the best times to ensure your hedges are healthy and polished. 

When to trim hedges

It’s not just how often you trim hedges that matters – when you trim them is crucial to their health. In Australia, the ideal time to trim hedges is when the weather is mild – not too hot or damp. For both evergreen and deciduous hedges, autumn and late spring are the best seasons for trimming.

Autumn: With fewer leaves on the branches, it’s easier to see the plant’s structure. Autumn trimming is also beneficial for the hedge’s growth, as removing unwanted buds before they come out allows the plant to take the energy that would have otherwise gone into blooming and use it elsewhere!

Late spring: A spring trim helps control the first flush of growth, keeping hedges neat as they enter the summer season.

When to avoid trimming

Think of freshly cut branches like open wounds –  they’re more vulnerable to environmental stress. If you decide to shape them up during the summer, you risk ending up with heat and sun-scorched branches. 

Dampness in the air poses another risk to fresh-cut branches and stems, whether it’s from summer humidity or wet winter weather. Just as with an open wound, moisture creates a breeding ground for bacteria and fungi, which can be detrimental to your hedge health-boosting efforts!

Trimming safely

If you’re thinking of trimming garden hedges yourself, then good gardening safety practices are a must! With sharp blades, ladders, and protruding branches, hedge trimming is risky business. To keep yourself safe, gather the necessary PPE supplies. These include heavy duty gloves, protective eyewear, non-slip boots or shoes, and a face mask to prevent dust, dirt, and insects from getting into your mouth. Long-sleeved clothing is also a good idea to keep your skin safe from scratches and the sun, particularly during springtime trimming.

Proper tool-handling is also incredibly important, especially if you plan on using electric trimmers and tools. Make sure you’re comfortable and confident, and know how to operate the equipment safely before you get stuck in.

Call in the Experts

At Jim’s Trees, we’ve helped countless homeowners perfect their gardens through our range of professionally curated services. Get in touch today to speak with one of our specialists about getting your yard in pristine shape!