Today on my lane they were hedge cutting. Before the second world war and before the advent of tarmac country lanes everywhere, they used to apportion one mile of roadway to a man and it was his job to keep it trimmed back. Usually local farmers or farm workers did this as part of their job description. The old tradition was of layering hedges, of half cutting hazel and bending it over so new growth would still grow from the stick and of course, cutting down in the late autumn after fruits had flowered and the birds had taken their fill – as well as the local country folk.
Now a mechanical trimmer rips at the hedges with a flail just as the fruits are a few weeks from fully ripening depriving the birds of their food (and small mammals) and keeping the hedges at least three feet too low for them to be good for nesting. It is almost as if centuries of hedge cutting was a blind for what we really wanted to do which was not care a damn for any other species on the planet.
Farmers of course love to be able to see over hedges as they drive past in their tractors and since they are now responsible for the hedge cutting they go at it with a passion for neatness and an eye for not being fined. But this new tradition has helped kill of wild flowers and animals. And it is utterly unnecessary to be so brutal.