Gardeners spend 10 weeks using cherry picker to trim 300-year-old hedges at Powis Castle, UK

Workers have begun undertaking the 'world's toughest gardening job' by using a cherry picker to trim the famous 300-year-old hedges at Powis Castle.

Gardener Dan Bull will spend ten weeks painstakingly pruning the gigantic 55ft (16m) hedges at the historic venue in Welshpool, mid Wales.

Each summer, he scales the castle's yew tumps and hedges using a hydraulic cherry picker and powered shears to keep them in pristine condition for the rest of the year.

There are almost 8,500 square meters of formal hedging and the 14 yew tumps, and a 14m high top terrace hedge adds a further 7,000 square meters to the gardener's mammoth task.

Originally planted in the 18th century, the hedges are almost 300-years-old and considered one of the greatest examples of Baroque garden design in Britain.

Dan said: "It’s a bit scary when we first start cutting them but after you have been in it for eight or nine weeks you get used to it.

"Basically it's like cutting your hedge at home just a bit higher up in the air. The garden here is pretty spectacular.

"I get a great sense of achievement and satisfaction when it’s all finished, and the tumps, as we refer to them, are back to the shape that our visitors, staff, and volunteers admire so much."

Luckily for Dan, advances in technology means he only spend around a fifth of the year tending the hedges, unlike the four months required in a bygone era.

It used to take 10 men 17 weeks to clip all the box and yew hedges using hand shears - all while perched on long ladders and tied together where necessary.

The hedges are among the largest in the entire country and form a stunning backdrop to the magnificent castle, originally built in 1200 as a medieval fortress.

Lady Violet, the wife of the fourth Earl of Powis, who was responsible for restoring the gardens, said they had the potential to be ‘the most beautiful in England and Wales’.

The hedges unusual cloud-like shapes tell the story of changing fashions in the horticultural world over hundreds of years.

They were originally clipped into small cones but allowed to grow more naturally and tree-like after landscape gardening became more popular by the end of the 18th century thanks to the likes of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown.

This lasted until formal gardening made a resurgence in the Victorian era and the yews were again clipped back giving them the unique shape that is still wowing visitors today.