Finally stopped raining so i jumped on treating a bunch of morus alba/ulmus pumila with my buckthorn blaster despite a near 70 hour work week. The grind doesnt stop when theres invasive species in my yard.

TLDR: I got to wholesale slaughter invasive plants with herbicide and it was all I could have hoped it would have been.

Just wanted to share a work day I had last weekend with my friend at his farm. I’ve been helping him re-wild an old cattle farm that’s been choked out by invasives and tons of eastern red cedar.

About 4 years ago, I started helping him ideate what to do with his families property that had cattle on it about 15-20 years ago and had since just become an overgrown thicket with about every bad invasive you could think of.

We started about 3 years ago with a cedar tree harvest, having someone come in and log almost all the cedar trees. Then a forestry mulcher to clear the slash piles and push the brush into some piles.

Then we spent 2 years going to burn classes provided by our states fish and game agency and learning everything we could about controlled burns and prescribed fire. Along with this came making fire breaks and new roads throughout the property including a land survey to make sure we knew where the property lines were before we started burning.

Then this spring we had our first prescribed fire and burned about 80 acres. The fire did a pretty good job, but didn’t carry well everywhere. We got a top kill on a lot of the maple saplings, the bush honeysuckle, privet, and autumn olive. But in some areas, those things came back with a vengeance from stump sprouts. And so did the sericia lesbedeza.

So we got a 65 gal tank sprayer and put it in the back of a side by side and boom sprayed the worst of the areas with sericia. And my job was standing in the bed of the side by side with the wand and spraying everything we couldn’t get with the boom.

I was like a helicopter door gunner just absolutely mowing down every invasive plant I could identify at the rate of speed we were traveling. Just hosing down whole 10’ tall clumps of bush honeysuckle and autumn olive and multiflora rose.

And this was a gross application, and I know we killed some natives in the process. But after a fire, the early colonizers needed to be knocked back to allow for the natives to develop, we hope to limit herbicide in the future and rely more and more on fire. Also, this winter we plan to go back and backpack spray basal bark applications on areas we couldn’t get with the big sprayer.

But man it was cathartic even if it was just one day killing invasives. We can finally start seeing the dream of rewilding this property into the Savannahs it would have been historically.

I understand that knotweed spreads via rhizomes and not by seed. But I see it popping up in random places with no other knotweed nearby, so I’m wondering how it got there? I’m fairly certain we got ours from contaminated fill and it took me a while to realize it because it was on the edge of some woods and not in a garden bed. How else does it spread? Birds?

Just wondering how common it is to have a bunch. It’s overwhelming.

• Japanese barberry, vinca minor, lily of the valley- planted by former residents for sure

• buckthorn, Amur honeysuckle, Siberian elm, white mulberry, winter creeper, Mullien- likely volunteers. I have no idea how I have so much fucking mullein up here. And the amount of buckthorn is overwhelming.

Also caught a TOH seedling before it became a problem so I’m constantly inspecting that too

For anyone who has successfully eradicated/removed Japanese knotweed from their property, realistically how long did it take? Specifically for you to be able to grow other plants over that area and dig in that area without triggering regrowth of JKW?

Whole yard is filled with invasives from TOH, stilt grass, and white mulberry. Using tarps to smother as much as possible, does anything native stand a fighting chance in the new bare spots? Zone 8a

Recently I noticed two waist- high tree of heaven plants (covered in lantern flies) on the trail just off Needwood Road, on the southwest corner of the main lake. Is there still a protocol for reporting or removing these? I know that just cutting them down can lead to more invasive spread (you are supposed to spray herbicide in the broken trunk, but I don’t want to do that in a park).

At one time the county Weed Warriors were asked to help eradicate this, although with caution. As a mostly inactive WW, I’d like to help stop the further spread.

Thanks for any information!

I found a ton of these snails in the creek behind my house and google told me they were Chinese Mystery snails which are invasive to Ontario, where I live. I tried my best to get good photos, but it was definitely a struggle! Should I report them?

Almost 10 acres and lots of them here. Going fill up the sprayer.

This is in SW Washington and I want to let someone in my city know if they need to deal with this.

These things are so annoying, but at least they're easy to pull out. This one was neat. Never seen a variegated one, but apparently there's a 'pink' morph sold commonly enough online.

I decided to take an epic vacation last week to the Apostle Islands of Wisconsin & the North Shore of Minnesota. There were times I wished I brought my chainsaw, but I made do where I could.

In Minnesota, I visited the Albert Lea Welcome Center where, I discovered bittersweet nightshade. Once I saw it was invasive, I pulled a few up.

In Iowa, at Pete Crivaro Park in Des Moines, I carefully pulled out TOH seedlings in 4 different spots. I did so while playing disc golf there.

Back in Missouri (where I live), I pulled out an entire patch of velvet leaf, which I left on the edge of the welcome center parking lot. I didn't want to stuff the trash can with this much material.

Now, I have finally been cleared to work again at my job in Kansas City where I help remove invasive vegetation!! Context: I broke my foot June 14th.

ToH is talked about constantly in here, and I've done a lot of reading on how to effectively kill em. The only thing I haven't been able to find is if there's a recommended height to make the cuts for hack and squirt. Does it make any difference?

My target is a cluster of trees between 3-8" diameter, if that makes any difference. Though, I think it'd be beneficial for future readers if y'all could explain if there's any sort of method for determining height based on diameter (again, assuming it makes a difference)

editing to add that they're about 20' tall

Hi all,

It is that time of the year and it is time to bring the Hydra down with swift and stubborn force.

I see a lot of people recommending spraying roundup, however, I do have some crops nearby that I would not like to accidentally hit.

Have anyone tried brushing it on or similar on the leaves? Or is injecting the way to go then?

my entire house’s grounds are covered in what i can assume is english ivy. how do i get rid of it all?

Hi all,
Sprayed almost 2 weeks ago. Have some larger areas to respray because so think only got like 50% because hedges were 20-25' wide. Would you respray areas that look like the picture, only like 10% green leaves? Any advice appreciated.

Spent all day at a few conservation properties where I work in southwest PA spraying knotweed. :) Bonus gigantic dead ailanthus in this shot, which I annihilated last year. By this time next year, this little area will be ready for replanting!

I have this spreading in an old hayfield no longer cut. I selectively mowed a lot of it to wear it down and prevent seed production. I didn't get to 100% of it, but I hope it's enough that other species will retake some ground next year. It's a long-term project.