Woven Maple Hedge?

[Travellar]

I seem to recall seeing a picture, not sure where, of a line of either maple or fruit trees which had been bent when young and supple to cross each other. The result after a few more years of growth was that the trees had grown into each other, forming a kind of solid living wood wall.

I find the idea interesting, though I'm not quite sure what I could use this for. Maybe the ultimate privacy fence? (I live out in the country, so I don't need one) Maybe as a kind of hedge?

As a side note, I've got a rather large grass maze in our pasture. (maze is about 1.5 acres) I've been thinking for a couple of years that it'd be nice to make it permanent, though the shear size renders traditional hedges unaffordable. Maple seeds, however, I have by the thousands.

This is just kind of an idea in it's formative stages right now, so I'm soliciting feedback.

[rainbowgardener]

This is called "pleaching": "Pleaching or plashing is a technique of interweaving living and dead branches through a hedge for stock control. Trees are planted in lines, the branches are woven together to strengthen and fill any weak spots until the hedge thickens. Branches in close contact may grow together, due to a natural phenomenon called inosculation, a natural graft. Pleach also means weaving of thin, whippy stems of trees to form a basketry effect." WIKI

It can be used to make a very dense hedge that can contain livestock:



or look like a living wall:


or all different kinds of woven effects:





people have even grown living furniture that way.


As you might guess, it is a labor of years and skill. And starting from little maple seedlings adds quite a few more years on to that before you can even work with them

If you wanted to try your hand, I would begin with well started hedge shrub plants like boxwood. Find a wholesaler, or check with big box stores near the end of the season when they discount it. Still talking about some years of working with them, but a lot fewer than maple seedlings.

[Travellar]

From seedlings, (essentially free cost-wise, at the expence of time), I figure I can have a basic hedge by 2025.
schedule:
Spring 2019- collect and start seeds
Fall 2019- find a way to keep the surviving plants alive over-winter
Fall 2020- transfer saplings into prepared beds (maze-walls)
Sometime 2021- first bends. tie alternating saplings together for first level of pleaching.
Sometime 2023- main shoots should be long enough to tie together the second level of pleaching.
2025- Third level of pleaching. I'm guessing the hedge will be ~24" tall at this point.
Future years: continue pleaching to make 24" square diamonds, Keep lower layers clear of leaves/branches, and allow to grow to a final height of ~6-7'. Trim top aggressively each spring/fall after that.
Long term plan: die. Leave a night indestructable hedge maze as my legacy.

[applestar]

Is this related to what you want to do?
Subject: Mailbox Garden Ideas

I have an on-going attempt to train/prune stepover espalier around the mailbox garden —

Subject: Mailbox Garden Ideas

...
Can I show my stepovers? I think they are starting to take shape.

^^^ that was from 2014. I decided to venture out and assess what needs to be done for the mailbox garden and discovered to my delight that some of the stepovers are starting to bloom — I Think maybe for the first time unless I posted elsewhere that they bloomed last spring? (I can’t remember....)

[Travellar]

Not so much on the step-overs.
I did get started this year on a hedge, using 20 yearlings from a cluster at one end of the yard. I used a post-hole digger to pull them out, and to dig their new homes. I'd say about half of them really didn't like it and almost croaked, but I think they are all showing signs of new growth, so yay! I'll save trying to do any pleaching until next year.
Tomorrow, hopefully, I'll be able to get a few hundred seeds started. That way, it'll be easier to do larger numbers next year. while I'm at it, I've got a few more clusters of young maples, so maybe I'll expand my little first attempt. If I feel really ambitious, I'll get some anti-weed netting down around my planned hedge.

[PaulF]

Saw a program on public tv where in some jungle they did that to trees and made a bridge over a stream that could carry heavy loads. One bridge had been in place for a couple of hundred years. They just kept replanting trees and weaving them into the bridge so when some parts dies there were others to take the place of the dead.

[Travellar]

My wife wants/has agreed to let me put a hedge around her garden. I figure in just a couple of years, this ought to keep the deer out, but eventually at the cost of SO many helicopters in her garden.

[rainbowgardener]

helicopters = winged maple seeds? We don't even have a maple tree in our yard, but they are nearby and my front yard was covered in thousands of them. I am now pulling baby maple trees like crazy. It sort of breaks my heart, they are so pretty. If I thought there was a market for them, I would pot them up and go in to business selling all the maple, walnut, and oak trees that volunteer in my yard.

I figure if we ever get tired of keeping up a lawn and gardens, we can just let them all grow and let our yard turn into a woodlot....

[Travellar]

They won't out-compete the grass, if it's in your yard. A lawnmower will save you the heartbreaking effort.

Flowerbeds and such, those are a different matter.

not a lot of market for maple wood, as I understand it. maybe as firewood...

[rainbowgardener]

They do mostly come up in the flower beds where the ground has been worked and is soft. The squirrels plant the walnuts and they also like soft ground to do it. Not only the flower beds, but every single flower pot/ container I have has sprouted walnut trees.

[Travellar]

Post-Summer update:
Had about a 40 foot line of young maples planted, only one or two died of natural causes. Neighbor came over to take the hay off the field and took out about half the line before he realized what it was. (that still left about 20 feet, and this is definately a learner hedge, so it's okay.) Biggest problem is controlling the grass around the trees, as I didn't put down mulch, or weed-netting, or anything else. Trees are still too small to use a weed-eater nearby, so I may be out there sometime with a pair of shears. All of the maple seeds I started died in the summer heat.

Some of the trees look to be just about long enough for the first stage of pleaching, I'll do that and a bit of pruning in the spring.

[applestar]

It sounds like a learning process like you said. I am familiar with gardening projects that don’t settle down to definable, repeatable routine until you become familiar with the growth patterns and growing needs.

Good luck!