Removing ivy?

Duff

Hey guys,

The brick wall at the side of the garage in my parent's house is covered in ivy and it's now starting to grow into the roof so would like to remove it completely. Just wondering what's the best way to go about it?

Thanks.

GinSoaked

Sort of three stages unless you just want to peel it off starting at the top?

First cut through as many of the stems just above ground level as you can, cut all of them if possible. no need to do this at ground level knee high if fine. Can be a pain to do and you need to make sure you leave a gap between the cuts (25mm) because Ivy will callus over those cuts and keep growing if you don't. You have to be careful cutting the stems as against a wall its easy to damage your tools. Try decent secateurs and loppers over saws and you can sometimes lever a gap with a crowbar but obviously don't damage the wall.

Next stage is to spray the cut stems with Roundup (there's a Roundup stump killer that may be useful) and keep doing this about every month until the stumps stop growing.

Finally after the Ivy has died and dried out (end of summer?) it will come off the wall much easier.

It is possible to spray the Ivy on the wall without doing any cutting but it will need to spray more than once probably 3 or 4 times to totally kill it or you could try the Dijon Mustard mix https://thisinterestsme.com/how-to-kill-ivy

Depending on the wall the Ivy might just pull of easily, I've removed huge areas of Ivy from very old walls just by pulling away at it but that tends to damage the wall but probably only as much as pulling off the dead Ivy. Most of the time its really hard to pull off.

macraignil

Instructions I read about this before said that the Ivy that is cut off from the roots died off anyway so I'm not sure all that spraying with round up is needed. The stump with no leaves attached wont have much surface to absorb the herbicide as it is normally taken in through actively growing leaves so I'm not sure how this is supposed to work as well. Not a herbicide user myself but some instructions on removing it I read made no mention of herbicide being needed. Can't find the directions I remember reading recently but here is a link to a RHS page on ivy control that suggests that just cutting the stems to weaken the plant and then digging up the root are possible as non chemical control.

CelticRambler

Duff wrote: »

it's now starting to grow into the roof so would like to remove it completely.

How much "into the roof" is it? That'll determine how much work it'll take. If it's gone in under the tiles, you'll need to get up on a ladder, cut the vines at gutter level and tease them out individually.

Otherwise, as it's a brick wall, I'd be confident enough taking a gung-ho approach: use a decent lop to cut through the fines as close to the ground as possible, then rip that vine off the wall. Repeat until everything's come down. While the vines are fresh, they hold together really well and you can pull 3 or 4 metres off in one go; once they dry out, they break and it takes ages to pull a million little bits off the wall.

standardg60

I just use the back of a spade to strip ivy off a wall.
Can be difficult to dig right out as it roots fairly deeply when established but the roots are very soft so can usually be chopped through a few inches below ground level, usually does the trick.