What kind of hedge do I need?

patsyrockem

Hi all, I am getting a patio area laid at the side of the house and need to grow some kind of hedge around it for privacy and windbreaker. My problem is that the whole thing is built on rock. I am a complete novice but this is my novice idea, feel free to criticise . My plan is to build a bed about 3 foot high around the patio with brick, fill it with top soil and set my hedge.
My questions are, in theory is this possible?
What kind of hedge (if any) would grow in such an environment?
Would i need to feed the soil?
How wide and deep would I need to build the bed?
Any advice would be much appreciated.

tampopo

biggest difficulty I can see is having to water it all the time. If it's on rock, and for all intents and purposes, sealed, then all liquid will have to be added. And that'd be a lot in the summer.
Anything is possible. Height, width etc. you would eventually have to start feeding the soil...but watering would turn into a chore from the off.

Cumin

I've seen box hedging growing in a bed around a patio just as you discribed. The plants are doing great. The bed is build with stone walls, about 2 1/2 foot tall and 3 foot wide (including the stone wall). Only thing is box grows very slow. If you have good topsoil then I think there is no need to feed in the first couple of years. But ones the roots start to fill out the bed I'd give it some kind of manure ones a year.

bazbrady

i planted a red robin hedge in about a 3 foot trench(there was very little soil) against a wall a few years back in a former house i had,it grew up to 4-5 foot where i wanted it and is still fine.granted the soil was all bought in very good quality and watered well along with aged manure every year top dressed.box would be good but beware of box blight.montys garden on gardeners world got destroyed by it the last few years.lavender is also lovely as a kinda hedge and loves free draining soil the best ,monty is actually growing a kinda lavender hedge this year,probably too small for you but .portugese laurel is nice,you dont want anything too fast growing or invasive either around a patio.