Last year during our Year of Living Englishly I wrote about my cousin Gordon’s work pleaching a hedge, and now I’ve come back to check on it.

Pleaching is a centuries-old art in which hedges are almost severed at ground-level and laid horizontal so that new shoots, growing vertically towards the sun, will create a lattice-like, growing “fence” that will be a home to wildlife and a natural barrier for farm animals.

Here’s Gordon’s hedge last year right after he pleached it:

Now, here’s the hedge as it looked today:  full of life with its sprigs growing towards the sun!

And, speaking of new life, here’s Meg with Millie’s eight puppies which haven’t yet opened their eyes.