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jesrush

Allow Ivy to Grow up Trees?

jesrush
11 years ago

I have some groud ivy (pictured below) creeping about ten feet up several oak trees in my back yard. It looks nice and seems harmless--for now. Should I let it continue or will it eventually harm my trees or become an eye sore?

Thank you!

Comments (62)

  • krnuttle
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Have you read what you posted. Some of the solutions they are using are 350 g/l. This is much higher than the 250g/l of the concentrated, and significantly higher the 0.96g/l in the ready to use solution.

    Per the government approved MSDS sheet the concentrate is not considered a carcinogen.

    Do a Google search on MSDS sheet for Roundup.

    http://www.energy.ca.gov/sitingcases/abengoa/documents/applicant/Attachments_Set_1B_Response/Attachment%20for%20Response%20to%20Item%2060/Monsanto%20Roundup%207071%20MSDS.pdf

    There are studies that have shown that Vitamin C has mutagenic properties. Vitamin C is necessary for life

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Around here, English ivy is very invasive and sometimes results in killing trees by covering them to the point that enough light is blocked so that the trees are weakened. In other words, it can indirectly lead to tree death. It very frequently leads to understory flora death, resulting in ivy monocultures in wooded areas. The biggest problems, as stated above, is that this plant is an invasive (environmentally destructive) pest in some parts of the US and can look awful when allowed to grow up trees.
    ______________________________________________

    "Roundup is similar to Agent Orange..."

    Water (plain H2O) is also a killer. Did you know people have actually died from drinking too much of this toxic chemical?

  • WxDano
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Around here, English ivy is very invasive and sometimes results in killing trees by covering them to the point that enough light is blocked so that the trees are weakened. In other words, it can indirectly lead to tree death.

    There are several parks in the Seattle area that have a fair number of trees that have passed away in this manner.

    A friend's youngest kid spent a summer on a crew clearing out English ivy from Seattle parks, and it is not easy. IMHO the key to killing this plant on a large scale is to start by damaging the leaves before spraying an herbicide. Then keeping on it until all your sweat and cursing has made it succumb.

    This post was edited by WxDano on Tue, Feb 26, 13 at 0:02

  • greenthumbzdude
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    "Water (plain H2O) is also a killer. Did you know people have actually died from drinking too much of this toxic chemical?"
    This is false. In order for water to become toxic one has purposely drink copious amounts of water for electrolyte imbalance to cause death. With herbicides, one only has to be exposed via skin contact for side effects to occur and contact does not have to be on purpose (example: child runs through freshly sprayed area without knowing)
    * I think that man made herbicides should not be used. Science has come far over the past couple hundred years but there is still alot out there that is unknown. Until we know all of the facts I refuse to use any herbicide.

  • WxDano
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    No, the statement Did you know people have actually died from drinking too much of this toxic chemical? is true. The old saying about the dose.

  • j0nd03
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Anytime water is mentioned as a killer I am always reminded of the following prank passed around in HS chemistry class.

    "Dihydrogen Monoxide (DHMO) is a colorless and odorless chemical compound... Its basis is the highly reactive hydroxyl radical, a species shown to mutate DNA, denature proteins, disrupt cell membranes, and chemically alter critical neurotransmitters."

    Full disclosure of DHMO and its ill effects at the link at the bottom.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Rabbit = English Ivy where it is a foreign invasive

    Knights' (heads) = Tree's infested with ivy

    Don't believe me?

    LOOK AT THE BONES!!!

    Simple!

    Here is a link that might be useful: DHMO

  • krnuttle
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    When considering the toxic of chemicals most people ignore the concentrations and the compounds in which they are found. Complexes of cobalt cyanide are non toxic, which can not be said for sodium cyanide.

    Selenium is a required nutrient for living organism, but in high levels will kill you.

    Every chemical and chemical compound has limits that above which it will have detrimental effects and below which will have no effect.

    If you take a 1% solution of sodium cyanide and dilute it a million times (1 milli liter into a liter and the 1 ml of that solution into another liter ) is significantly below the lethal dose.

    By the way more people die of water overdoses than any other chemical in use. If you don't believe that look at the number of drowning per years. drowning is an overdose.

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I'm going to say things that will irritate people, and then I will never visit this thread again. But, I am not trolling because I will be making substantive points.

    The sophomoric stuff about water is a waste of my braincells: no toxicologist considers drowning to be a toxic reaction to water. Or drinking so much of it that one has an electrolyte imbalance. These are physiological problems. Water is non-toxic.

    "Crossbow also happens to contain a carcinogen"
    don't bring it to a picnic

    "Roundup is similar to Agent Orange in that it causes birth defects in mammals. "
    don't drink it if you're pregnant

    Seriously, people, the use of these by serious gardeners is 1% of 1% of 1% of the amount used by agrobiz. Much more dangerous chemicals are either banned entirely or banned from domestic use and still used by commercial interests. Grind your axe somewhere that makes sense, like the "lawn care" companies that are probably destroying the Chesapeake Bay by fulfilling their contracts that spread nitrogen fertilizer on McMansion lawns 3X a year. There will never be anything less "toxic" that can do what these 2 do, so the answer isn't hysterically banning them, it's using them more responsibly. I've gotten so many broadleaved weeds out of my lawn, and kept them out by cutting high, that I don't even need to broadcast spray anymore. When I see the odd dandelion I just spot treat it. People need to leave the putting green look to the golf courses.

    As to the ivy, I understand why it has to go in the PNW. That is an entirely different ecology, agronomic history, and climate to the east coast of the US. It will never be as damaging around here. In my own garden, it fills a niche that would otherwise be occupied by nasties like poison ivy or wild roses, and will be removed over my dead body. Are we going to pull down all the ivy from Princeton's buildings (not much, actually) and let poison ivy replace it? Should we call it the poison ivy league? (some people probably already think this lol) Breaking news: the environment of the eastern 2/3 of the country has been _permanently_ altered, especially the northeast corridor. If we want to fix it, we should all pack up and move back to Europe, Asia, Africa or wherever we came from. Suburbia creates vast swaths of forest edge that can never be "right". Those are the places ivy invades. BTW because the antlered rats no longer have predators, and we "manage" them so that they are sufficiently prevalent that hunters won't face any pesky intellectual challenges in finding them, they are destroying the local ecology, too.

    I do remove the mature foliage form, which takes years to develop on tree trunks. But the ground covering it performs...guess what...keeps me from having to use crossbow to take out poison ivy! See how a balanced approach works for both issues! No need to eliminate ivy where it's only causing minor alterations to an already heavily altered landscape, and no need to have hysteria over chemicals that are probably barely more toxic that's what's already added to children's candy as coloring.

    Everyone "concerned" with non-natives needs to read this essay:

    Here is a link that might be useful: http://arnoldia.arboretum.harvard.edu/pdf/articles/483.pdf

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Before someone blows their own horn to correct me: ivy in this extremely tenuous context can refer to Parthenocissus; but I've seen Hedera on buildings at UPenn & Princeton and since the whole thing is obviously rather anglo-aspirant, they both count.

  • krnuttle
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    davidrt28

    Please stick around this forum needs more technically knowledgeable people to keep the "sky is fall" ones under control

  • hortster
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    If H. helix is such a killer it doesn't seem to have done much to this (now evergreen!) Ulmus pumila.
    hortster

  • j0nd03
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I love it when people start replies with something along the lines of "I know this is gonna piss some people off..." and then state they will enter lurk mode while they hope to see the flames that ensue.

    How is this NOT trolling, david?

    In my garden to my eyes it looks out of place and unnatural. (I wonder why this could be?) But I don't like the look of any vine on a tree trunk. On a trellis, many vines look great, especially in flower. I have an old section of fence consumed in campsis radicans and nesting birds as well as humming birds and insects love it! As much as I enjoy this every year, I would never allow it to grow on any tree I cared to look at. I am almost repulsed by this look in a landscaped area. Just my personal taste.

    This ivy mentioned literally eliminates the mature bark aspect of trees which may or may not matter to the owner. I do agree as a groundcover it is pretty harmless and limits weeding considerably. My parents have had ivy as a groundcover in several beds for 20+ years and I don't recall ever seeing it escape into the woods, not that I looked very close. It is the next owner that will most likely stop whacking the ivy back at the base of the ancient oak tree trunks and allow it to take in full sun and flower/fruit/disseminate.

    John

    Edit: and I hope my previous picture was taken in the light hearted manner it was intended. No, the ivy does not out right kill trees unless the tree is perhaps in a weakened state from storm damage etc and the ivy shades out the leaves on the host tree. What is does do is increase the competition for water and nutrients like any other growing green thing when growing in the root zone of another green thing. How much this ivy requires from its environment, I haven't the slightest clue.

    This post was edited by j0nd03 on Tue, Feb 26, 13 at 17:39

  • lkz5ia
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Wow hortster, cool pic

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Greenthumbzdude, I hope you not only realize that what I said was literally true but that it was meant as sarcasm to highlight the sky-is-falling nature of your response concerning RoundUp. Davidrt28's point about small homeowner use of this type of chemical is right on target. I wouldn't blame someone for being concerned about the effects of the truly vast amount of this stuff that is being used in agriculture today, but fear mongering the homeowner by comparing the chemical (in the context of this thread) to Agent Orange is, IMO, just way over the top. And, P.S.....I can pretty much guarantee that you use way more harmful chemicals in your house on a weekly basis.

    I don't agree with Davidrt28's apparent defeatist viewpoint about invasives, because it's like saying that our highways are already littered so people should now feel free to throw out as much trash as they want. I can see that that viewpoint may have some validity (as we've discussed in an earlier thread about the philosophy concerning invasives), but just think that there's more to it than that.

    This post was edited by brandon7 on Tue, Feb 26, 13 at 18:50

  • Toronado3800 Zone 6 St Louis
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I have owned trees for long enough to see house crunching branches fall off during storms.

    In the tree line I allow the vines to live. I cut them back every year and kill some sk they do nit become too much of a trouble.

    Where them vines are growing up the trees I can not plainly see any trunk defects. Sometimes me, my car or my KID are under these trees.

    Evergreen vines are double the danger if not more. I view them as an unnecessary risk in suburban settings. Good thing I am not an insurance agent!

    We are the (usually) sentient beings. It is ojr responsibility to manage our trees.

    Oh, and yeah, Round Up and my car's exhaust aren't good for me. I am reasonably careful with each.

  • WxDano
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Davidrt28's point about small homeowner use of this type of chemical is right on target. I wouldn't blame someone for being concerned about the effects of the truly vast amount of this stuff that is being used in agriculture today, but fear mongering the homeowner

    Totally on board with the orders of magnitude more chemical used by big ag, but I used to live in the watershed of one of the most impaired urban creeks in the US, and it was because of overuse of organophosphates by the gardeners of the well-to-do. As soon as some preemptive actions were taken in the area, RU et al. use went down and the creek started to recover. The impervious cover and compacted soils in urban areas mean a lot when talking about runoff. The same is true with the creeks' fecal coliform problems in KY-TN area that were lessened by picking up the dog cr@p.

  • hortster
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    lkz5ia - this tree blooms yellow in the very top with black fruit each summer. Have watched it hoping the damn Siberian elm would succumb. Owner must like it. Hedera is not invasive here because of the incredibly hot summers and intense sun - doesn't like it here. The pic doesn't show the NE side of the tree where it began climbing, but it seemingly doesn't spread on the ground on this yard's west exposure.
    "Invasives" like this are not invasive everywhere; nonetheless introduced plants often get that way. Hedera was originally from N. Africa and W. Asia. USA now suffers with displacement and competiton in many areas.
    hortster

  • c2g
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Took me about two years (and a half dozen bouts with poison ivy) of hand pulling to control the English ivy that dominated my yard when we moved in. I'm surrounded by it as both neighbors let it engulf everything, but it's fairly easy to control at this point. A 10 minute walk through every three months or so pull up remnants is all it takes these days.

    Second the recommendation for Virginia Creeper as a replacement. I let it take over the main area I pulled the ivy from and it's a great ground cover, and in early fall it attracts tons of birds and has magnificent color.

    It's painful to walk past the huge properties in my neighborhood that border the woods. Large patches have essentially become monocultures thanks to years of dumping yard waste across the street. Next month we have 50 volunteers coming to spend a day pulling English ivy from a protected area of woods. Sadly, it will hardly make a dent as we spend countless hours trying to at least keep it away from the interior.

  • bengz6westmd
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    c2g has it -- depends on the vine. VA creeper isn't very aggressive. Hummingbird vine & wild grape are OK too, IMO (but don't let them climb your house). Others like English & Poison Ivy, Wisteria & nasty Kudzu -- too aggressive/dangerous.

  • Iris GW
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    But isn't poison ivy only "too dangerous" because of the rash caused in humans? It doesn't hurt a tree and the berries are greatly relished by wildlife.

  • Sara Malone Zone 9b
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Not sure if this is a problem in other parts of the country but ivy in quantity around here often harbors rats so we discourage it - whether climbing up a tree, over an arbor, along a fence, etc. The most common type of ivy here is Algerian ivy.

  • j0nd03
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    "But isn't poison ivy only "too dangerous" because of the rash caused in humans? It doesn't hurt a tree and the berries are greatly relished by wildlife."

    It also has great fall color around here. Much better than virginia creeper that many claim colors great in other areas.

    I have a persimmon at the edge of the property probably ~35 feet tall and only half the canopy is persimmon - the other half is poison ivy. It has shaded out the lower half or so of the persimmon and as it continues to meander up the trunk. I believe some of the ivy branches are close to 8' long. I was surprised (to put it mildly) when I finally figured out what was going on. I did not know a vine could so efficiently take over/claim/reclaim open space on a tree so far away from the trunk.

    John

  • jesrush
    Original Author
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Wow -- kicked off quite the discussion! Point taken -- I'll snip the connections to the ground and pull it off in a year or two. Thank you for the advice!

  • vieja_gw
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Had some of that outside ivy find a spot near a viga to crawl in & begin 'decorating' a wall inside one of our rooms! Guess 'everything has a place' .... but not inside my house!!

  • Brandon Smith
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Can someone please explain to me poison ivys purpose for existing, seriously?

  • WxDano
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Poison ivy's function in the ecosystem is the same for any vine. Just because it has evolved an anti-herbivory defense doesn't make it useless.

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    bsmith, this is really getting off-topic for this thread, but to answer your question briefly...

    Toxicodendron radicans (poison ivy) is a well-loved and important food source for many birds, deer, and other animals. It is used in herbal medicine for things ranging from rheumatism to various skin disorders. It's oil is sometimes used as a lacquer and to make certain inks and dyes. Some (crazy) people actually use it as a colorful garden plant. And I've even heard of it being used as a substitute for TP (mostly in bad jokes though).

  • Iris GW
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Yes, poison ivy berries are an important source of food for birds that eat berries. I believe that only humans are bothered by it.

  • siriusconspiracy
    9 years ago

    Humans are an invasive species and should be rooted up and composted.


  • siriusconspiracy
    9 years ago

    Oh, and by the way, we are not discussing ground ivy,Glechoma hederacea, the picture shows English ivy.


  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    9 years ago

    "Humans are an invasive species and should be rooted up and composted."

    How about we start with you, Siriusconspiracy! Or, if you feel like you are that much of a pest, why not gallantly take maters into your own hands?

  • siriusconspiracy
    9 years ago

    Touche! But I would be in favor of removing all of us, leave one and we'll come right back and destroy everything!
    Seriously, I made the comment to point out that most species would be considered "invasive." Given the chance, species will expand their range. It's not so much that the specie is invasive as it is disturbing to the new ecosystem and displacing the local species.

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    9 years ago

    Invasiveness is not really about extending a species' range. A species can extend its range and not be invasive. An invasive harms existing species (usually by displacement) as its range increases. As humans, we have the opportunity or ability not to be so invasive! We have the responsibility to limit how our actions impact other species, including introducing invasives into our environment.


  • wisconsitom
    9 years ago

    Kinda hard to believe-I didn't utter one word in this thread! Oops!

    ;^)

  • seattletransplant
    8 years ago

    A few points, somewhat speculative based mostly on personal experience (clearing ivy off several hundred trees in Seattle):


    Ivy is technically a parasite even it its native habitat in that it has a negative impact on its host, but the impact there is fairly minor. It shortens the life of trees a bit, making them a little more susceptible to windfall, occasionally pulling down weaker branches, and forcing them to devote more energy to the strength of trunk and branches than the trees would otherwise. But it rarely kills them outright.


    It wouldn’t be very successful if it did. When an ivy-covered tree in the forest falls down, the ivy falls too. That might mean a year or so of full sun for the parts of the ivy that survive, but other sun-loving plants will quickly overshadow it. Despite the talk of “ivy deserts”, a sunny ivy field isn’t a stable ecosystem. In Seattle other invasives like blackberry, bindweed, and clematis will win out.


    Its strategy to avoid killing is in its life cycle. When it gets enough sun – generally when it grows high enough — it switches to the adult mode. It devotes energy to making berries and grows much slower, with bush-like branches away from the trunk rather than going straight up. Eventually it may overwhelm the tree as the tree’s growth slows, but it’s not a big threat.


    That’s how it works with deciduous trees. Perhaps the bark of trees here is a bit more vulnerable than that in Europe; I don’t know. But I’ve seen 30-year-old vines climbing up native big-leaf maples; clearly the ivy is taking its time.


    Evergreen trees are another story. Evergreens allow much less light to the trunk over the course of the year, and so ivy growing up them doesn’t switch to the adult phase. It just keeps growing, faster than the tree, up the trunk, out the branches, right to the ends, killing them. Ivy ravages the evergreens here in the Pacific Northwest.


    I have a hypothesis (without much good data) that the range of evergreen forests in Europe is actually defined by the temperatures at which ivy can survive. The climax forests in England are deciduous, while in the Pacific Northwest (with even warmer winters but no native ivy) our forests are evergreen.


    But as I said, much of this is speculative. If someone has thoughts on this I’d love to heard them.

  • Huggorm
    8 years ago

    "I have a hypothesis (without much good data) that the range of evergreen
    forests in Europe is actually defined by the temperatures at which ivy
    can survive. The climax forests in England are deciduous, while in the
    Pacific Northwest (with even warmer winters but no native ivy) our
    forests are evergreen."
    That's an interesting hypothesis. I live on the west coast of sweden, where the native range of ivy and evergreen conifers are overlaping slightly. Norway spruce is growing pretty much all over the scandinavian peninsula, except coastal locations in the south. Ivy on the other hand, does only grow in the mild climate along the coast in the south. The contrast is actually pretty significant, it seems like one starts where the other ends. In mainland europe spruce and fir are basically growing in mountainous areas with colder climate, areas where ivy will struggle to survive. Pines are a totally different story though, a variety of species grow all over europe, side by side with ivy.

  • blakrab Centex
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    glyphosate is in the 'probably carcinogenic' 2A category

    several studies have shown that people who work with the herbicide seem
    to be at increased risk of a cancer type called non-Hodgkin lymphoma

    evidence, including from animal studies, led the IARC to its
    ‘probably carcinogenic’ classification. Glyphosate has been linked to
    tumours in mice and rats
    — and there is also what the IARC classifies as
    ‘mechanistic evidence’, such as DNA damage to human cells from exposure
    to glyphosate
    .

    Kathryn Guyton, a senior toxicologist in the monographs programme at
    the IARC and one of the authors of the study, says, “In the case of
    glyphosate, because the evidence in experimental animals was sufficient
    and the evidence in humans was limited, that would put the agent into
    group 2A
    .”

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    8 years ago

    Blakrab, what does this have to do with the topic at hand? Let me go ahead and answer...NOTHING!

    Your post contains cherry-picked selections from an already cherry-picked report. Could glyphosate be carcinogenic? Sure, anything's possible, but many common household items have a much better chance of being so!

    If you want to post this Henny Penny kind of stuff, at least start your own thread instead of polluting someone else's thread with it!

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    The theory about ivy is actually really interesting, and deserves its own thread rather than this old turd. Yes, I said I would never post here again. I never did - on gardenweb! All bets are off on Houzz!
    As I said somewhere above, I understand the PNW seeing ivy as a menace, and seattletransport characterizes the risks well. Here on the east coast, I think it is probably desirable to remove in certain native areas, but not a problem in others. Nor would it ever been possible to completely remove anyhow. There are already natives that can strangle trees like wild grape. They have a chance to strangle trees because forest openings permit them to become established. The northeast corridor is always going to pocketed with forest openings like swiss cheese. Completely different from say, the highway south of the Willamette valley in Oregon, where you could drive for miles with very scant evidence of human habitation, besides the road itself. (compare: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/NPP/news/earth-at-night.html The areas with bright lights from Boston to DC are the zone 6b and zn 7 areas where Hedera can survive) So, the ultimate problem is really human habitation and population density in my opinion, not the invasive species itself in some cases.

    If we want to worry about an introduced vine on the east coast, let's worry about Asian Celastrus. 100X more virulent and dangerous than Hedera in my opinion.

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    8 years ago

    David, I don't know where you live, but apparently it's not in my part of the country, because you aren't familiar with the forests around here. If you were, you would have an entirely different opinion about the potential for this plant's invasiveness!


  • Embothrium
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    Just spent 2 hours as a volunteer pulling ivy (mostly Irish ivy) off trees in a local park. The extensive and frequent patches it forms are a real headache. Where there is chipper access and time available (October to February) the involved parks department is cutting off the also abundant infestations of English holly and English laurel, grinding them up and blowing them onto the ivy patches. They are backing off of herbicide applications and using this method instead (the layers they are putting down are pretty thick).

    This particular park is 48 acres, I figure I will go back each week all summer and keep pawing at the stuff.

    And that will be effective as long as I or another come back every year and do it.

    Meanwhile the ground patches will continue to spread, wherever the smothering has not been undertaken and been successful.

    Wooded parks and other properties here in the vicinity of human concentrations are well on their way to becoming woody Eurasian weed ghettos.

    A percentage of local land already is.

    Absolutely never plant these anywhere they are able to reproduce:

    Acer platanoides

    Clematis vitalba

    Cotoneaster rehderi

    Crataegus monogyna

    Hedera helix and subspecies

    Ilex aquifolium

    Prunus laurocerasus

    Prunus lusitanica

    Rubus armeniacus

    Rubus laciniatus

    Sorbus aucuparia

    Stranvaesia davidiana

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    Brandon,

    I have never seen it invade truly pristine wilderness. It's always in suburbia, urban areas, along railroad right of ways or highways, etc. Places where some vine, native or exotic, is going to invade anyhow. I'm not saying it isn't undesirable, I'm just saying there are bigger things to worry about by far. Kudzu can overtake an area 10X faster than ivy.
    ranked as a "lesser threat" in your state, by your state.
    http://www.tneppc.org/invasive_plants/115

  • wisconsitom
    8 years ago

    Very interesting ideas, Seattletransplants. I recently read a research paper showing vines period-vines all over the world-seeming to be gaining some kind of advantage over trees. Most of this study was done in Central America, where so many forces are at work against the indiginous flora, but it touched too on wild grape in N. temperate zone sites. I've witnessed personally what seems like an explosion of wild grape on conifers here in NE WI. Roadside trees are favored, for the reason, I should think, of increased light levels. What bothers me is that evidently, I'm in an extremely small minority of people seeing and worrying about this.

    Wild grape-to continue down that road-is not parasitic per se, but it sure does do these trees in in a few short years, causing a cloak of shade around the trees' foliage as surely as if a giant tarp had been laid over them. +oM

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    8 years ago

    Tom, not the article you read, presumably, but I did find this: http://www.npr.org/2013/10/18/237100768/vines-choking-out-trees-in-the-tropics


  • Embothrium
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    From link provided by esh (above):

    English ivy is a vigorous growing vine that impacts all levels of disturbed and undisturbed forested areas

    Branch dieback proceeds from the lower to upper branches, often leaving the tree with just a small green “broccoli head.”


    English ivy has been reported to be invasive in natural areas in 18 states and the District of Columbia.

    http://www.nps.gov/plants/alien/fact/hehe1.htm

  • Toronado3800 Zone 6 St Louis
    8 years ago

    This picture tells me everything I need to know about trees and ivy.

    1. Ivy is not a death sentence for a tree.

    2. Ivy makes a tree more likely to fail as it increases the wind/snow/ice load the tree must hold.

    3. Ivy does not belong on trees in a normal residential setting. It hides otherwise obvious structural defects and prevents the OWNER from being able to make an informed decision on his/her tree's health.


  • Embothrium
    8 years ago

    Broccoli effect evident in above photo, with tree becoming reduced to isolated compact sections of foliage instead of maintaining a full canopy.


  • wisconsitom
    8 years ago

    davidrt28 (zone 7)

    Tom, not the article you read, presumably, but I did find this:http://www.npr.org/2013/10/18/237100768/vines-choking-out-trees-in-the-tropics

    Absolutely David. Missed that particular Science Friday, but yes, that's the exact topic. And even the stuff I'm seeing definitely relates to this "edge effect", being along roads. Thanks for the link.

    +oM

  • davidrt28 (zone 7)
    8 years ago
    last modified: 8 years ago

    Well the edges are the problem. You can blame ivy all you want but if you got rid of it, you'd just have trees ruined eventually by grape, smilax, poison ivy, parthenocissus, native roses, whatever. (and kudzu in the south)

    "Broccoli effect evident in above photo, with tree becoming reduced to
    isolated compact sections of foliage instead of maintaining a full
    canopy."

    Although it would look ugly for a while, it would have truly been the work of a moment to kill that ivy off, at any point in past 10-15 years it probably took to get that way, with any old cheap chainsaw. And without risking lung irritation as you would by taking a chainsaw to poison ivy. (I wore a solvent grade respirator mask and eye protection when I did it once to a 5" vine, then took an immediate shower.) I can't accept poorly maintained residential lot trees as a reason to worry about Hedera.

  • brandon7 TN_zone7
    8 years ago

    I frequently see multi-acre patches of near monoculture of this stuff, including in natural areas where there's been minimal to no disturbance/development in many years/decades. At least in this area, English Ivy seems to invade natural areas (forests) to a much greater degree than kudzu. Kudzu is more common on disturbed land, especially along highways and power line right of ways.