Please browse our list of occasional papers below. These are being completed as time allows. Some are in draft form and await illustrations and updating, so if you have downloaded papers before please keep an eye open for the later version. Forthcoming titles are given in a separate list.
Some of these files have many illustrations and may take a short while to download, so please be patient.
Until the Cornish Hedges Library was established in 1994, Cornwall's ancient and unique hedges had been largely ignored by the specialists. The function of our hedges had been taken for granted, their landscape value unacknowledged, their history not generally realised, their wildlife overlooked. The skilled craft of building them was unwritten, in danger of being forgotten as the old traditional hedgers passed on.
These hedges have always been very much loved by the general public. The authors of the Cornish Hedges Library have collected the gleanings from the writings and word-of-mouth legacy of older generations to add to their own knowledge and present a definitive source of literature on this subject. The library meets the demand for information on all aspects of Cornish hedges, for which there is no other existing source of full and reliable written material.
You are welcome to download and print the papers and photographs for your private use and study, but if any material from this website is reproduced in any way acknowledgement must be made of the copyright holder and the Cornish Hedges Library source.