Another gardening question. The property we are now at, we've had for 7 years, and there has so much work (in and out) to do, that I've almost given up. However, the large amount of yew hedging is one thing to continues to motivate me. In the first summer, after removing a sumac tree, we noticed that 4 of the yews next to it, had died. These were replaced and over the years as I've bought the hedge down in height (from about 8' down to 6'), these 4 have now basically caught up. However, over time as more neglect (from the last owners) has cleared been up, I've since had to undertake three more "dig out the dead and replace with new sapling" operations.
Unfortunately the most recent recovery (this really now must the last!), had me being a little too laissez-faire, in so far as the watering policy. The history is that last summer after clearing ground (removing buddleias and huge cotoneaster thing) we uncovered yet another deceased fellow in the midst. So in the summer (as part of the annual summer yew hedge trim) we cleared a big gap (else the newcomer won't get sufficient sun+air), and then in the autumn we got the new chap, from our favourite source (a rather interesting mother + grownup son and daughter arrangement) in a cottage/smallholding/nursery in a wood at the bottom of a drove! They keep their plants very well however, and are much cheaper than garden centers and have much more knowledge on what they are selling than any other outlets we've ever visited. Anyway I planted this in about October/November just gone and basically composed/bone-mealed/drenched the young lad in, and then left it over the winter. When spring then summer came, since (slightly earlier in the season) it looked basically okay, and since apparently yews don't like to be in much standing water, I only watered it a couple of times.
Alas 3 or 4 weeks back we noticed that it was starting to look pretty bad - especially the higher parts (the sapling is about 2' feet high at guess) were really quite yellow. We did see some newer green buds closer to the center, so we knew it wasn't dead. I decided that it was probably my watering neglect that had caused this. So I've since started really drenching it every 2 or 3 days, if we've had a hot dry spell with no intervening rain. It now seems clear that it is responding positively to this treatment, that is the main parts of the plant are greening up some more and the buds near the stem are getting bigger and more are appearing. However the top 3 or 4 inches (i.e. the leader) are almost certainly beyond help. They've not greened up, in fact it's fair to say that the yellowishness has changed to a more lighter brown (i.e. dead
) colour.My question is: shall I just cut off this apparently dead couple of inches now or wait a year? I appreciate that it's dead, and I do now have much experience cutting back very aggressively (i.e. with a small chainsaw) other of our established yews in order to shape/remove hard dry dead etc. and to be honest (this is why I really like yew hedging) they are growing back really well. However since this yew has only been in our ground for less than a year, I'm a tad anxious that actually cutting it now might upset this burst of life which we have managed to encourage.
thanks Matt