Bolton Conservation Volunteers at Anglezarke Reservoir for hedge laying competition 11-03-2018

Bolton Conservation Volunteers meet at Anglezarke Reservoir for their fifteenth annual hedge laying competition in memory of Dr John Leather, the group's hedge laying guru.
Four teams of two and a fifth team of one compete. The competition is introduced by Rick Parker of BCV, who also acted as judge. The hedges are laid in the Lancashire style where the laid branches are kept roughly parallel, beginning close to the ground, though this is a second laying for this particular hedge.
Hege laying, originally practised as a form of stock management, lengthens the life of hedges and ultimately makes them denser, providing lots of safe nesting sites for birds as well as shelter for small mammals and amphibia.
The video and music are by The Thing in my Soup, and the winners' stills are by Colin Mather.