How do I shelter an exposed, windy garden?

Wind does more damage in most UK gardens than cold does. It desiccates foliage, rocks new plants loose at the roots, snaps growth and makes a garden unpleasant to sit in, and all of it responds to filtering rather than blocking.

What you'll need

• Windbreak netting or slatted panels
• Hedging plants (optional)
• Stakes and ties
• Ground anchors or posts

Step by step

1. Work out where the wind comes from.In most of the UK the prevailing wind is south-westerly, but local topography, buildings and gaps between them change it completely. Watch which way plants lean and which corner is always cold.
2. Aim to filter, not to block.A barrier that lets roughly half the wind through slows the rest without creating an eddy. A solid barrier lifts wind over the top and drops it back down as turbulence a short way behind.
3. Use height to calculate reach.Effective shelter from a permeable barrier extends roughly ten times its height downwind. A 2m hedge shelters about 20m of garden; a 2m solid fence shelters far less.
4. Plant a hedge for the permanent answer.Hawthorn, blackthorn, hornbeam, beech, escallonia and griselinia all make good windbreaks. Native mixed hedging is cheap as bare-root whips in winter and grows fast.
5. Protect the hedge while it establishes.Windbreak netting on posts on the windward side for the first two or three years. A new hedge on an exposed site without it grows slowly and one-sided.
6. Use slatted fencing where you need it now.Hit-and-miss or slatted panels with gaps filter wind, look reasonable, and survive gales that flatten close-boarded panels.
7. Stagger multiple barriers.On a large exposed site, two or three permeable belts across the plot work far better than one tall barrier at the boundary.
8. Stake and shelter new planting.Everything planted on an exposed site needs low staking and often individual shelter for the first couple of years. Wind rock at the base is what kills them.
9. Choose wind-tolerant plants.Small leathery or needle leaves cope; large soft leaves shred. Sea buckthorn, tamarisk, escallonia, olearia, rosemary, elaeagnus and most grasses do well.
10. Shelter the seating area separately.A small permeable screen or a group of large shrubs around the sitting-out area gives an immediate and very noticeable improvement without changing the whole garden.

Tips

• Ten times the height of a permeable barrier, two to five times for a solid one. That is the whole argument.
• A solid fence in an exposed garden takes the full wind load and is the first thing to go over.
• Bare-root hedging whips planted in winter are a fraction of the cost of pot-grown plants and establish faster.

Common mistakes

• Building a tall solid fence to stop the wind — It creates a turbulent eddy that lands in the garden a few metres behind it, so the sheltered zone is small and disturbed, and the fence itself is far more likely to blow down.
• Planting a hedge on an exposed site with no temporary shelter — It grows slowly, leans, and often browns off on the windward side. Two or three years of windbreak netting on posts transforms establishment.

If it doesn't work

Questions people ask