Frank Mitchell said it for us in his book Where has Ireland Come From? "Many miles of hedgerow which were happy hosts to plants and birds are swept away . . . In 1973 the whole Irish landscape was dragged into the EC net." Well, one resident of the farther Dublin suburbs decided that the outer wall of her piece of land would be reinforced on the inside by a thorough countryside hedge. Impenetrable to the human who might scale the wall, prickly, dangerous and yet wide enough to be really what such a planting is often described as: a linear forest. And anyway, for the hell of it. The basic element absolutely has to be hawthorn and, more importantly, blackthorn. So many scores of thornquicks went into the ground. Slow, but sure and deadly. Meantime, in went quicker-growing shrubs and trees and climbers. Ash, some of which can be kept at shrub size while others are allowed to soar. Broom, perhaps, for colour; the hazel, of course. This latter has the advantage that as it grows it can provide lovely straight stems for supporting peas or beans in the kitchen garden. To give colour and the genuine rural touch, some wild rose. And rowan. Several oaks of four or five feet went in, more as encouragement for the early days than anything else. For surely only one or two can be permitted to grow - the whole hedge is about 100 yards long.
How wide the hedge will be, no one quite knows - yet. Oh, honeysuckle was a must. And a fuchsia here and there. And it wouldn't be the real thing if there were not a couple of crabs. Some people who have for long been travelling by road to Galway still remember a glorious line of crab-apple trees just westward of Kilrickle. In autumn the ground would be carpeted with peachy-red apples around the trees. Then the trees were felled.
What about a bit of willow, just for the catkins in spring? Blackberries will come automatically, for the field has many brambles. A bit of whin, furze or gorse as you call it. Remember that used to be the only, or almost only, known form of enclosure. See Dr A. T. Lucas's book Furze (The Stationery Office 1960). He quotes a tourist looking from the Rock of Cashel in 1790, lamenting: "Not a quickset ditch and scarce a single tree in the great horizon before you." And why shouldn't you try your hand at the bottom of your garden, no matter what size, with a lovely mixum-gatherum like this? Maybe too late this year for the thornquicks, but others can go in soon. Frank Mitchell's book is dated 1994, from Country House, £6.95. Y