Of Thorn & Briar by Paul Lamb: Meet Instagram’s hunky hedgelayer heartthrob
Of Thorn & Briar: A Year with the West Country Hedgelayer by Paul Lamb (Simon & Schuster £20, 304pp)
Since the 1950s, around 118,000 miles of Britain’s hedgerows have been lost, gobbled up as fields disappeared to make way for new houses and roads.
Hedges and hedgerows have been a feature of our landscape since the Bronze Age, and some of the ones that survive today date back to medieval or even Anglo-Saxon times.
They are more than just an attractive feature of the countryside: hedgerows are a vital habitat for birds and small mammals, a rich source of food for wild animals, a windbreak and a defence against flooding.
After decades of destruction and neglect, there are encouraging signs that hedgerows are finally being seen as a precious resource.
Hot on the heels of last year’s Hedgelands, writer Christopher Hart’s love letter to the nation’s hedges, comes this beguiling book about a year in the life of a 21st-century hedgelayer.
‘Hedgers’, as they are known, used to be familiar figures in the countryside but are now a vanishing breed, and it’s not hard to see why.
Hedgelaying – cutting and bending a hedgerow’s stems to encourage growth, and planting new shrubs to rejuvenate the hedgerow – is not a job for the faint-hearted. Even the toughest gloves are no protection against shrubs like blackthorn, which is ravishing when it’s in flower but also possessed of the most vicious thorns.
Traditionally, hedgelaying takes place when there’s an ‘r’ in the month, so for a good chunk of the time a hedger is battling wind and rain and is chilled to the bone.
Skilled: Traditional hedgelaying is a craft that is passed on down generations
And it’s demanding work: on an average day, fuelled by nothing more than bread, peanut butter, chocolate and a flask of tea, Lamb might plant as many as 200 saplings in the hedgerows.
In summer, when the hedgerows need to be left alone, he helps with farm harvests and works as a charcoal burner.
His patch is the West Country, especially Dorset, which is fitting as Lamb is someone who could be straight out of a Thomas Hardy novel.
He lives alone, travelling from place to place in an ageing horsebox which is lit by paraffin lamps and candles. He knows he will never get rich from his work, but he doesn’t seem to mind, seeing himself as part of a long line of people who have cared for the countryside down the centuries.
You sense that seeing the ebb and flow of the seasons and working to improve the environment is infinitely more precious than money to him.
Written without a hint of the pretentiousness that sometimes mars nature books, this spare but elegant account is an unexpected delight, and as soothing as a walk down a tree-dappled lane at sunset.
Hedgelaying heartthrob: Lamb has an army of fans on Instagram
Lamb has also become a somewhat unlikely influencer (with 195,000 Instagram followers) and I was pleased to see recent posts of him cosying up to his new girlfriend.
Though not all his fans were as delighted, with one commenting ‘you’ve broken a lot of women’s hearts’.