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| Is there such a thing?
I am turning a bed of ivy into something else. I have ripped out all the surface ivy and roots and most of the deep roots. My question is, what to do with the top soil that is totally encompassed with tiny ivy roots? If I till it back in and cover it for the winter, will it be decomposed by spring? Do I chuck it? TIA |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by joepyeweed 5b IL (My Page) on Thu, Sep 23, 10 at 13:37
| Tilling is only going to break up the rhizomes possibly creating more plants to sprout. I would probably smother the bed with a thick layer of wet newspapers and then cover that with a thick layer of mulch (either shredded leaves, wood chips, shredded bark, whichever was cheap and readily available). Spreading plants like Ivy won't be completely killed by smothering, but it should set them back enough that you can keep on top of what sprouts next spring with some had pulling (or, gasp!, herbicide if you are so inclined). |
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| Yes, there seems to be an endless supply of roots. If I do the newspaper/shredded stuff route, will it be ready to plant in spring? Also, what should i do with the "bad" dirt I've got in piles? |
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| Smothering has mixed results at best. I would remove as much ivy as possible by hand pulling and not till with ivy still present. Ivy is very tough and regenerates pretty well as I know all too well from experience. If you are wacko enough you can sieve the root-contaminated soil and let it bake in the sun to dessicate and kill any residual live ivy in it and then put the soil back (not the greatest thing for soil but neither is the ivy). Ivy pieces should be put somewhere to dessicate and die (like on pavement, on a rock, or on a brush pile) and then be composted. If you have a really hot compost pile you can throw the pieces right in. I know it sounds like lots of work but more labor in the beginning is best with ivy in my experience. Any deep roots you can't pull out from the bed should be cut and given an immediate spray of herbicide on the fresh cut. Ivy generally does not root very deep though so you should probably be able to dig out all or almost all of it. I'm not a big herbicide fan but I'm not a big ivy fan either. My best success yet was removing well-established ivy from a bed by hand in fall and then planting cereal rye in the bed over the fall through beginning of spring. None of the ivy came back and the bed is now a thriving butterfly garden. Ivy can give some people a mild dermititis with enough contact so wear gloves if this concerns you. You might even then have a few stray bits to pull later on but it should not be much if at all. |
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| Thanks for the responses. bob64-- I am doing that with one small bed that was covered in ivy, sowing it with buckwheat. I guess I will do the same with all of them. I'm just not sure what to do with my contaminated dirt. |
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| Any thoughts on how to get rid of wild morning glory vines? It's everywhere, my raised beds. outside garden, compost, and in the greenhouse. Maybe I should move to another county. Thanks Ken |
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| Some plants, Ivy and Bindweed (wild Morning Glory), Quack Grass, can be tough to kill off with just newspaper, or carboard, and a mulch so they need the roots dug out of the proposed bed(s) or regrowth will occur. Your topsoil is not really contaminated, it just has a lot of potential noxious "weed" roots. A lot of work is involved but digging them out is not immpossible. |
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| If you are really wacko you can dig out and sieve the bulk of the ivy out of the dirt and then sun bake the sieved dirt to dessicate and dry to death any remaining ivy. The reasons I used cereal rye are: (1) it is ridiculously easy to grow - all I did was throw bare seed on the ground and left it alone and it grew strongly; (2) it can be sown in mid to late fall (at least around here) which was when I happened to need something; and (3) it is supposed to have some alleopathic properties which, possibly, did some damage to any remaining ivy and other weeds. Don't know enought about buckwheat to comment although I've been thinking about experimenting with it. In my experience english ivy does not leave a lot of super fine roots in the soil (and I've now pulled up truckloads worth). The vines tend to pull out mostly intact. Perhaps you have other plant roots mixed in or maybe you just have an even greater density of ivy than I have had? By the way, I have had very little success with herbicide sprayed onto ivy leaves. Spraying onto a freshly cut stem may/should work better. Ivy is one of those plants where hand labor is usually the way to go. |
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| Morning Glory & all seed annuals can be killed by tilling or turning the soil every 3 weeks or as soon as the new soil becomes covered with young new plants. Do this all Spring & summer. Mix in a little compost as you go & you will be building the soil as you turn the young weeds. You will be making your weeds in to a green manure. You must not let any annuals in the garden form seeds or you will lose the war, again. |
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