Moss on / in old boxwood hedge

ronanphilip

We have an old boxwood hedge. There is a lot of moss growing on / in it. We have manually removed a lot of it by hand the last 2 years but it just comes back again. It is damaging the hedge. Is there anything we can put on it to kill the moss but but not damage the hedge ?






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magicbastarder

photos?
box has a separate problem at the moment, unconnected with moss - box blight. it may be that if your box is struggling, blight is to blame.

ronanphilip

magicbastarder wrote: »

photos?
box has a separate problem at the moment, unconnected with moss - box blight. it may be that if your box is struggling, blight is to blame.

Hi, I have added 2 photos I took back on 20th April.

standardg60

What a fabulous hedge, apply a granular fertilizer and see if it improves, moss hates feed.

ronanphilip

standardg60 wrote: »

What a fabulous hedge, apply a granular fertilizer and see if it improves, moss hates feed.

Have you an example of the type of thing you would put on it ?

looksee

I would think that the moss is growing because the hedge is struggling rather than the moss is causing the problem. The suggestion of box blight seems quite likely, in which case you need a suitable fungicide.

The Continental Op

I'd be interested to look under the hedge. If its chock full of leaves and debris then I'd clean it all out to improve the air flow.

Box is know for getting very dense in on the top which reduces air movement. Its not intuitive to cut holes in the top of the hedge but I have heard of similar happening and it was helped because the hedge was used for cuttings for propagation which took some of the density out of the top.

magicbastarder

the sides of the hedge seem unaffected though (i know very little about box, to be fair); i would assume the moss likes it if there's very little movement of air within the hedge itself, and it stays nice and humid?

Mango Joe

Was reading up on Buxus recently and seemingly it can be pruned back quite hard and bounce back if all other conditions are ok.

Might be an idea to consider shaping it to the exact height and depth that's ideal for you, clearing out the old debris lodged in the heart of it and then it should recover nicely.

Caveat is that it will take time to green up again and you'll be looking at a bunch of sticks for some time.

standardg60

ronanphilip wrote: »

Have you an example of the type of thing you would put on it ?

Something like 10-10-20 OP, the big bags you'd get in a farmer's co-op.

Agree about the airflow too, but that looks like a daunting task, so i'd try the feeding first.