A day for hedging
On Monday I was just outside chatting to a neighbour when I managed to flag down a passing tree surgeon and got him to quote for shortening the Leylandii trunks and trimming the hedges. He also said how about trimming the silver birch, and I said wouldn’t the pond be in the way, and he said no, so I said do the silver birch as well.
(It is, of course, sometimes a bad idea to have work done on the house or garden by someone who just happens to be passing. However, I have had this tree surgeon’s leaflet through my door a few times over several years. Anyone who has been in business as a tree surgeon for several years is probably competent, for obvious reasons).
So on Friday, as the FTSE-100 soared to its biggest one-day percentage rise since it was invented, and short-selling was banned on financial shares, I handed over the entire contents of my hedge fund to the tree surgeon, and the sun shone brightly all day. I think he did a good job, although I don’t think he trimmed the hedges as neatly as my usual tree surgeon. However, it was a good price, the hedges look miles better than they did before, and most importantly, he happened to be there when I needed the job done. He trimmed my Leylandii trunks to about 3 ft high. I would have preferred them to be a little longer (I asked him to do 4-5 ft) so I could have more leverage, but I think I will be able to manage fine.
Leylandii trunks cut down to about 3 feet
I may be taking a short position on my beautiful Lawsonian Cypress ‘Pelts Blue’ in the corner next spring, but that’s only to make it more bushy, not because I can’t afford a stake for it and want to get the government to prop it up for me. OK, enough of the hedging jokes.
This morning the sun was still shining for some reason, and I started digging the Leylandii up. I started in the corner, because this one is the biggest tree and the hardest to get at, so I thought I would do it first and then the others will seem much easier. My technique for digging up trees is to dig a big hole around them and trim away any small roots, just leaving the big ones. Then I can cut through the big roots and push the tree over.
Leylandii with roots exposed
Just getting to the stage shown in the photograph was a lot of work. I think it may have taken as much as an hour and a half. At this point I realised that the whole task was going to cost thousands of calories, so I went in for a cup of tea and baked myself a cake.