Briars and Ivy taking over Ireland

I'd have to agree. I've seen briars grow 10 ft in a year. I've taken to spraying now with Graze On Pro. Ivy I cut at base of tree.

The widespread use of electric fencing, cattle not being outwintered anymore and most farmers being part time are the reasons i think.
Every tree in the country seems to be smothered by ivy now.
It’s very satisfying to cut it at the butt and see it die off.

_Brian wrote: »

My mother keeps saying that the countryside is unrecognisable with overgrowth in the last 20 years.

We have two corners set aside where briars etc are allowed do their thing.

Most boundaries are fenced with electric wire. We used to spray these but stopped for environment and cost reasons. Means much more manual work trimming and cutting back briars off fences. But we’re not loosing ground to them every year. Electric fences are in same line last two decades.

Electric fence are only a joke on a boundary fence unless the flail can go between the fence and the ditch. dairy farmers think they have fenced when thy stick an electric fence along side a boundary ditch when in fact they are destroying the ditch as I've never seen them leaving room for the flail, briars thrive in those conditions, Sheep farmers fence for everyone

Biscuitus wrote: »

I had to take a drive to pick up a machinery part over the weekend. From coast to coast Ireland is being overrun by briars any ivy. Every fence along the motorway, every back road, every farm and field was covered in briars. Some sticking out into the road, covering entire fences and ditches. Neighbouring dairy and sheep farms that were kept immaculate are now struggling to stay on top of briars.

Then there's ivy. Every tree is being covered. It's like a parasite and eventually kills them and pulls them down. No matter the time of year ivy grows and as soon as it hits a tree it races to the top.

How are you fighting this problem on your farm? Is this just a problem from climate change we have to deal with. I've read that both are growing more cause of the milder winters.

They are the two most important plants for pollinators in this country.
Far from a problem if there was any reasonable amount of hedge management out there. Unfortunately proper hedge management is a thing of the past

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

I'd have to agree. I've seen briars grow 10 ft in a year. I've taken to spraying now with Graze On Pro. Ivy I cut at base of tree.

You're spraying them and I'm planting them

Birdnuts wrote: »

If a tree is healthy, ivy won't bother it. Plus as others have mentioned its an important source of food for pollinators, cover for nesting birds and source of trace elements for cattle and sheep. Its the sterilisation of the countryside by sprays and heavy machinery is what I notice far more then a bit of nature around the place

It’s not true to say that if a tree is healthy that ivy won’t bother it.
Ivy will smother and eventually kill the trees and do the same with the likes of whitethorn bushes.
Large parts of this country will be sterilized of farmers and briars and weeds will cover the country with the way things are heading.

tanko wrote: »

It’s not true to say that if a tree is healthy that ivy won’t bother it.
Ivy will smother and eventually kill the trees and do the same with the likes of whitethorn bushes.
Large parts of this country will be sterilized of farmers and briars and weeds will cover the country with the way things are heading.

I've yet to see a healthy mature tree die due to ivy - if a tree suddenly looks sick its much more likely to be a fungal disease of the type hitting Ash, Elm etc. currently. Another issue would be damage to roots due to ploughing etc..

_Brian wrote: »

Electric fence is best thing ever.
I’m happy with briars and other wild flowers behind the electric fence on the ditch. It’s great some for biodiversity to thrive.

The only joke is the lads that think a flail is the only way to treat a boundary.

It's a joke when the ditch pushes down the fence and kills the shock enabling the cattle to climb the bank and jump into my land, then the crack starts when they can't get the heifers back over my sheep wire and barbed wire.
The real joke was cutting .my sheep wire and barbed wire, not on their boundary but out on to a private road so I couldn't accuse them ....... but they were seen. so forgive me if I regard an electric fence threaded through badly maintained briars a joke.

Frankx wrote: »

I think I've a problem with ivy on a mature tree

How do u take it off

Just cut it at the bottom of the trees and it will die off.

Say my name wrote: »

I think Wrangler referred to this earlier.

The biggest reason ivy and brambles are perceived to be taking over in some parts is because landowners have been busy out spraying round up on their ditches.

Landowners have basically made monocultures of their boundaries. The competition has been removed and ivy and brambles take advantage of the situation.

Now yere looking for another spray to kill the ivy and briars.
If the roundup was left in the can the problem wouldn't be there.
Nature abhors a vaccum.

If you spray a ditch with grazon it'll be a few years before it get's as bad again, also if you spray a bank for a few years with roundup the bank starts to fall away because there's no scutch roots to hold the clay in banks, I used to have a problem with neighbours spraying my banks to get visibility on a private road with roundup, I had to tell one guy three times, eventually I told him he could strim it if he wanted visibility. You wouldn't be surprised to hear it wasn't strimmed

I think grazeon kills whitethorn as well so you have to be careful

Frankx wrote: »

How would you know

It’ll be obvious if the tree is dead.
Just cut the Ivy and hope for the best.

Frankx wrote: »

Obvious how though I'm no tree expert

There should be leaves on the trees this time of the year, if there's not it's dead

listermint wrote: »

Spraying chemicals all over them seems like a sound solution...

..

If you need to kill a tree you have to drill holes in it and inject roundup into it so a spraymist isn't going to be much harm

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

I don't like spraying briars. I'd rather just cut them back but the work involved seems endless. I cut them back with a battery hedge cutter but maybe I'm getting too old for that now.
Ivy adds a lot of weight and wind drag to tall trees, helping to bring then down in high winds. Whenever there's a storm here it is nearly always the ivy laden ones that come down.

I haven't sprayed the hedges/under the electric fence since 2017 and I haven't used any herbicides around the farm or yard since 2018.
I have a small (3') old Bamford flail that I use to trim behind the fences during the closed period and I use a similarly aged Lely 4 disc mower to top under them during the Summer. I previously posted (a couple of years ago) looking for recommendations for a light weight petrol hedge trimmer as I was getting too old/worn out using my brothers powerful but heavy Tanaka long reach one. I bought a McCulloch ErgoLite for about €240 and it's the best yoke I've bought in years. I can run along behind the fence and trim off the overgrowing briars, whitethorn and whins.
https://besthedgetrimmers.co.uk/best-petrol-hedge-trimmers/mcculloch-ergolite-6028/

Frankx wrote: »

I think I've a problem with ivy on a mature tree

How do u take it off

Look at the base of the tree and see where the Ivy stems are growing up. Cut a section of the Ivy stems near the base of the tree (1' or 2'), then cut another section about 4" up. If its mature Ivy get a hammer or pinch bar and prise the cut sections out to leave a gap. The uppermost part of the Ivy will die but the stem end will still continue to grow. If you want to kill off the stem end then paint those sections nearest the ground with an approved brushwood herbicide. Depending on the age of the Ivy growing on the tree there maybe several Ivy stems intersecting each other so follow each stem as it appears around the base and around the trunk of the tree.

Most people think that Ivy is a parasitic plant (like mistletoe) and that it lives off the nutrients on the tree that it growing on - it doesn't. Ivy has its own system that transfers nutrients/water between it's root and leaves.

TBH I quit cutting Ivy stems on our trees several years ago after listening to Philip McCabe (RIP) - the bee man on Mooney Goes Wild. He told how important Ivy flowers are to our bumblebees so that they could stock up stores coming into Winter. Ivy comes into flower in Autumn so its a very important plant for our wild bees and pollinators to store up for Winter.