Planting a living fence

One morning last August, I woke up to find my potager ravaged by a wild boar.  Boars are too plentiful in our area of Haute Provence.  They have proliferated as fewer herds of grazing sheep have allowed abundant oak forests to re-establish.  That sounds like a good thing.  Only problem is, acorns are the number one food source of boars.

The omnivorous boar or boars visited my garden not to harvest acorns, or even garden produce, but to root in the moist soil under my straw mulch for fat, juicy earthworms--a protein source for the hogs that is otherwise in short supply in Provence, at least during the dry summer months.  The destruction stunned me.

My usual guardian angel Jean-Claude immediately strung up an electric fence for me--the sort of electrified webbing he uses to construct moveable enclosures for his sheep.  It worked fine, but was truly unsightly, its bright red plastic clashing horribly with the ongoing look of old stones and organic plants.  We tolerated it to the end of the gardening season, but began actively thinking about permanent solutions to the pig problem. 

I'd long had the fantasy of one day planting a living woven willow fence around this garden.  This technique has been practiced in France since the Middle Ages, and has always been most prevalent in areas rich in willow growing and basket-weaving.  In fact, woven living fences are a logical, large-scale evolution of basket weaving, capitalizing on the suppleness and toughness of willow branches coupled to their exceptionally strong capacity to root easily.  (Want to make your own natural 'rooting hormone'?  Simply soak willow bark in a bucket of water for a couple of days, then dip your cuttings in the resulting willow bark 'tea.'.)

My idea was that a woven willow fence would not only keep out marauding beasts, but also would serve to frame the garden in the prettiest--and most authentically frenchgardening--way imaginable.  I'd been in love with the technique ever since observing it in the Loire Valley.  Now, the boar invasion had given me an excuse to turn a dream into reality.  I came a giant step closer to this realization when Denis and I met a couple of young basketweavers who'd come down from the Alps to participate in a festival in the town of Sisteron this past summer.  When we discovered they also wove living fences, we asked them to prepare an estimate for our project.

In warmer climates, late fall is the time to install such a fence.  The residual warmth in the soil plus the long, cool rainy season ahead make this the optimal time for the willow branches to root well before the long dry summer heat.  Also, I'd had a complicated surgery  on my foot at the end of September, and as I wanted to be up and about for the installation, I knew that I'd need at least a couple of months' convalescence before being able to walk on the uneven ground around the garden.

Early December brought unusually cold and snowy weather to most of France, and I began to worry about the installation of our fence.  Then, a sudden thaw brought me a Friday phone call from our wild willow guys (right), Florian and Mircea.  They wanted to plant right away; would I be able to come down to Provence at the beginning of next week?  The forecast was for mild weather.  Of course, I agreed.

Before the planting, we'd hired someone to scrape the topsoil from a 1-meter (yard) band around the garden and cover it with gravel, creating a path for my wheelbarrow.  Then, the same person worked the soil to a depth of about 18 inches in another 1-meter band just outside the gravel in preparation for receiving the willow.

The willow guys along with two helpers had already been working hard for a day and half by the time I got there.  The results were breathtaking.  From being a fragile island of cultivation encroached on on all sides by burgeoning meadow plants and weeds, my garden had been transformed into a calming and civilised place that I barely recognized.  The clean gravel around the perimeter turned my weedometer down to zero, at least for a moment, and invited a tranquil tour around the garden.  And the willow!  That gracile lattice warmly colored in gold and russet bark clearly marked the territory within as mine--an island of (relative) order, of fragrance, bounty and biodiversity--with the surrounding wilderness both animal and vegetable held at bay.  Might I recommend such a transformation as intensive calming therapy for any panicked gardener trying to wrest her territory from the persistent wilderness?  I felt a little like Laura Ingalls Wilder beholding her first split rail fence.



But unlike Laura's fence, mine was living!  And it was woven!  A woven willow fence is the perfect example of the gentle exploitation of nature to human ends.  It begins, as I've said, with a thorough and deep soil preparation.  Our native soil here is loamy, so we added nothing to it other than the incorporation of the existing sod layer.  After stringing lines to mark out the planting crisply, slender wooden supports are installed every meter and a half (4.5 feet). 











These are necessary until the willow becomes well rooted and the lattice rigid.  Then, a piece of iron rebar or other equivalent tool is used to poke holes in the loose soil at 6-inch invervals to accept the freshly cut willow branches.  These are inserted to a depth of about a foot and half.

Because the branches will be bent in either direction at 45 degrees for weaving the lattice, you need at least two branches per hole.  For our fence, we used four branches--two of Salix fragilis and two of Salix viminalis. (S. viminalis is the willow species richest in salicylic acid, or aspirin.  Guess I'll be able to munch on its leaves when all this gardening gives me a headache.)  This 4-branch option was obviously more expensive, but made for a stronger and sturdier fence.  Using two different willow species allowed for a contrast of winter bark colors--red and yellow.  Many shrubby willow species are can be used to weave a willow fence.  I would recommend using native, locally adapted species if you want to try this technique in the U.S.  If, like we did, you use two different species, make sure they are approximately equivalent in growth rate and vigor.  Winter bark color is another factor to consider, although it is always more apparent on younger twigs.  Obviously, branches must be cut during the dormant season and used within a few days of cutting.  In USDA Zones 6 and northward, this is a project for early spring.  South of there, start in late fall as we did.

Once the clusters of willow branches are inserted and the ground firmed around them, the weaving begins.  We bent one half of the branches (making sure to use one of each species) at 45 degrees to one side and the remaining ones at 45 degrees to the other, weaving them under and over their neighbors in a classic "basketweave."  This may sound difficult but it's actually quite simple and rapid when you are doing it.  The result gives a lattice approximately 6 inches on a side.  Continue to the desired height (about 5 feet in our case), leaving the last foot or so of the branches unwoven.

Now comes one of the most charming aspects of constructing a living woven fence.  To stabilize the lattice and make sure its lozenges remain regularly spaced, it is necessary to attach the willow branches here and there  where they cross, and also to attach the lattice to the supports.  Here, a perfectly harmonious, ecological, and traditional technique comes into play:  the use of  terminal lengths of willow twig to make a special knots around the junctures of the branches.  Next week (as of 13 january 2011) I promise to write up a step by step instruction on how to do this under Photo story on this website.  This knotting technique with willow dates to the dawn of frenchgardening history.  I already talked about it once during the dawn of this website (nearly 10 years ago now), when I described how it was used to attach climbing roses in the rose garden of Bagatelles in Paris.

As you make the knots (you don't need knots at every juncture; just at strategic ones), you will want to fine-tune your lattice, adjusting the space between the branches as well as the juncture points.    Remember, your goal is not a machine-made regularity, but a neat-as-possible handmade look. 


Finally, you're left with the question of how to handle the top edge of the lattice, where your willow branches end in an uneven bristle.  I've seen woven fences where this bristle was left as-is, but this is too unkempt looking for me, especially as the plants leaf out.  We opted to create a rustically twisted edge, without agonizing too much about the occasional stray spray sticking out.  Where the lattice arrives at a gate post, however (there are two gateways in the fence), the branch terminals are gathered into a bunch on the post, creating a vase-shaped bouquet that crowns the post in a whimsical way.  Willow terminals are used throughout to secure the edges as well as the lattice.






Of course, being present during the planting and weaving of our fence was a huge privilege and a priceless learning opportunity for me.  Florian and Mircea kindly and patiently taught me the rudiments of how to do it, and the hands-on experience was necessary to fix the process in my brain so I could write about it intelligently.  Please note the frown of concentration of the serious student at left.  I mean, it's not every day you get to learn a medieval frenchgardening technique!  I particularly loved learning how to make the knots, a technique I'd admired for years but never quite mastered.


One special feature we'd requested for our fence was a sort of bulge at one end of the garden, where the willow would be higher and eventually trained in an overhang.  Here we planned to put a bench, where Denis could admire my efforts while I, well, why I expended the effort!  (I admire Denis' ability to simply stop and contemplate as much as he admires my ability to never stop weeding.)  This feature is called an ombrière (shade maker) in French.  Florian and Mircea had brought some extra tall willow branches to construct this part of the fence.  In the close up below left, you can appreciate not only the curve from the back of the ombrière, but also the colorful effect of using two different willow species.

One thing is certain:  the world would be a better place if it were populated with Mirceas and Florians.  In spite of having to drive 2 hours to get here, they had prepared and packed a brunch for us to share.  And they not only create woven living fences, but also basketry garden edgings (nonliving), as well as decorative and utilitarian baskets of every description.  They conduct basketry workshops for everyday folk as well as for children and handicapped people.  And their farm is not only organic but biodynamic.  They are people who walk the walk.  Florian used an expression of speech more than once that deeply impressed me.  In proposing his help, he would preface his proposal with, "It is with great joy that I would..."  To experience that joy for yourself or for more information about garden creations or workshops (English spoken, charmingly!) contact them at L'Oseraie du Possible and tell them I sent you .  You won't be disappointed!

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