How to Make a Deadwood Screen

Special note: I have two in-person workshops in the pipeline at Orchard Barn. If you'd like to be the first to hear about them, get onto my email list here.

A couple of weeks ago I helped out at a wonderful place in Suffolk called Orchard Barn. I’ll be writing more about this inspiring project in the coming months, but in brief, Orchard Barn is an environmental and heritage centre specialising in traditional local building methods. They take in volunteers for various natural building projects, and are particularly well-known to me because of their extensive use of traditionally-made roof shingles, something I’m can't wait to cover at a later date.
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But for today, the project I was helping out on was simple, inexpensive, and something anyone could do: A deadwood screen.

Deadwood Screens
There is a frustrating tendency for moderns to deem their prunings and cuttings as rubbish. So what do they do next? Burn the cuttings in a bonfire, or send them to the tip. The next thing they do is go and buy fencing. But...there is another way! We can make deadwood screens instead.

Loppers, secateurs, and saws: the tools of the trade.

How to make one?
As you can see below, the larger and thicker branches are cut into posts. Two rows of these posts were stuck in the ground. This was already done when I arrived.
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Next we lopped off longer, bendier branches, clipped them clean, and wove them in and out of the posts, a bit like a wattle. You end up with two wicker walls.

All the small clippings and trimmings of wood were then chopped and used to fill in between the two woven screens.

The result is a tough screen, tough enough to fend off sheep, for example. A deadwood screen can be used to fence off areas of land, it can create a compost area, firewood storage enclosures, or a simple barrier to separate one part of a garden or land from another.

Animal-Friendly and Encourages Diversity
The deadwood screen also creates a home for small (often endangered) wildlife like shrews and hibernating hedgehogs, and gives them a hiding place from predators. It  creates a habitat for nesting birds and other small creatures, too.

A habitat for all kinds of wildlife.

Related Links:​
You can read more about Orchard Barn, or follow them on Facebook.
They have also made a nice little video documenting the deadwood screen.

I have two in-person workshops in the pipeline at Orchard Barn. If you'd like to be the first to hear about them, get onto my email list here.

Sign up to hear about my next in-person workshops in the UK

Sarah Partridge, manager of the Orchard Barn project.