Is the old hedgerow between my property and the farm next door the property line?

Why hedgerows look like property lines

Many hedgerows grew up along old fence rows and field edges, where nobody plowed or mowed. In Oley Township, which has been a National Register historic district since 1983, the boundaries and hedgerows on many properties go back to land grants from the William Penn era. The valley was settled from 1725 by German, French Huguenot and Swiss farmers.

But farms were divided, lanes were moved, and hedgerows spread. A hedgerow can wander several feet off the line it started on, or follow a field edge that was never the boundary. Older farmette deeds in this area often describe the land by metes and bounds, with courses and distances from landmarks, and the original corner markers may be long gone.

What actually decides the line

1. Your deed and the deeds of the neighbors. The legal description is the starting point. In Berks County they're recorded with the county.
2. Any recorded subdivision plan. If your lot was carved out of a farm, the plan may show the line and the markers set at the time.
3. A boundary survey by a Pennsylvania licensed professional land surveyor. The surveyor researches the deeds, looks for monuments, and marks the line on the ground. That's the line we build to.

Some townships build this uncertainty into their codes. The Boyertown-Colebrookdale-Pike joint zoning ordinance recommends keeping a fence at least 1 ft inside the lot line, partly "to account for possible inaccurate lot lines," and Colebrookdale requires 2 ft unless the neighbor signs a waiver. Muhlenberg and Elverson let the Zoning Officer require a surveyor to mark an uncertain line.

Where adverse possession comes in

Pennsylvania lets someone gain title to land they've possessed for 21 years (42 Pa.C.S. §5530), if the possession meets a list of legal requirements, among them that it was open, exclusive and hostile to the owner. In Burns v. Mitchell, keeping a lawn mowed up to a fence counted as actual possession. So decades of farming or mowing up to a hedgerow can matter legally, on either side of it.

That doesn't mean the hedgerow has become the line. Adverse possession claims turn on detailed facts, and we can't predict how one would come out. If the survey and the hedgerow disagree by more than a little, talk to a Pennsylvania real-estate attorney before anyone builds.

Fencing near a hedgerow, practically

• Get the survey first, then decide the fence line. Setting it a foot or two inside your side of the line avoids most arguments.
• If the hedgerow straddles the line, some of those trees may be your neighbor's. Talk before you clear anything.
• Hedgerow roots and old stone piles slow post-hole digging. Around Boyertown and Bally, add Reading Prong gneiss rubble to that list.
• Old hedgerows often hide a rusted woven-wire or barbed-wire fence. Pulling it out is part of the job and part of the estimate.
• Utility lines don't follow hedgerows, so we still place the PA One Call request.

Once you have a survey, send it with your estimate request. We'll lay the fence out from the surveyor's markers, not from the hedgerow.

Common questions