Kitchen Garden Forum

Sad times for the owners of all those hyper hedges.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -bite.html

I have said in the past that i wondered if it was these aphids that was causing this dieback.

5/6 years ago the Leylandii in my garden in Hemel Hempstead did suffer quite a bit of dieback and we cut down several. However, here in Carmarthenshire I can look out the front and back windows and see several hundred feet of Leylandii hedges, not to mention several large trees and not a sign of any dieback. Brown patches can also be caused by overpruning or doing it at the wrong time, so I wonder if some of the damage that people see will be wrongly attributed.

We have lots of these trees round here whose owners won't do anything about trimming them back and they're causing a great deal of angst to nearby owners, so for some, their demise can't come a moment too soon.

I'm far more concerned about the horse chestnut trees in our locality. The branches of some of them are starting to turn brown and die and I'm wondering if this too is being caused by insects or some kind of disease.

I noticed a lot of horse chestnuts in a nearby village going brown. We wondered if it was rust, but it might be aphids - does anyone know? That would be a real shame.

By the way, we've finally persuaded a neighbour who has a stretch of land adjoining our veg patch to cut down 22 leylandii! Haven't seen any sign of aphids yet.
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Granny

[quote="Granny"]I noticed a lot of horse chestnuts in a nearby village going brown. We wondered if it was rust, but it might be aphids - does anyone know? That would be a real shame.


Hi,

Some information on the Chestnuts here. Doesn't look good I'm afraid.

http://www.woodlands.co.uk/blog/conserv ... -chestnut/

Thanks PJ. I've checked on this site and have a horrible feeling that the trees are affected by Bleeding Canker. If they have to be felled it will completely change the local landscape and be a real tragedy. We have so enjoyed the avenue of flowering white candles every spring. I can remember how Dutch Elm Disease affected the landscape years ago.

Hi Primrose,

Reading that site doesn't exactly fill you with much hope does it. I too can remember the devastation of the Elms.

We have lost several horse chestnuts in the village the last two or three years. At first some branches started to die off and then the whole tree was affected and had to be felled. It seems to be a repeat of Dutch elm disease.

Thanks for the info PJ. (Just remembered about it!)
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Granny

Having got rid of 12 of the blighters to make room and light in our garden I'm not sorry.

Not in the slightest.

If I got my hands on the genius that planted ours......