The goal is to completely disconnect the ivy from the ground. Everything above the cut will die.

 

This is perhaps the most important skill for ivy removal.

 

I keep changing my preferred way of doing this, so I may change my mind about what is optimal.

 

STEPS

 

There are two steps to girdling the ivy on a tree. For minimal infestations, you only need to do the first.

 

STEP 1

 

Use a machete, billhook or handsaw to cut away the smaller vines and leaves to expose the larger lianas, if they exist.

 

The easiest way to do this is to grab the vines at the very bottom of the tree, where they aren’t attached tightly, and pull them away from the tree.

 

Then cut the vines high, rip them out of the ground as much as “easily possible”, cut them low (if necessary), then toss them away from the tree.

 

In summary, in one fluid motion

grab vines

pull away

slash high

rip out

slash low

toss away

 

or

 

grab, pull, slash, rip, slash, toss

 

Ideally, grab and cut as many vines as possible with one motion.

 

For step #1, you shouldn’t be trying to cut vines that take more than two slashes to cut.

 

Kneepads allow one to quickly kneel on the ground with little discomfort, allowing one to most quickly grab the vines where the tree meets the ground.

 

Just throw the cut vines on the ground, they will usually die.

 

It is beneficial to pull out as much of the roots as possible. This has to be weighed against speed, of course, and it is a grey-area what is optimal.

 

It is beneficial to cut the vines as low as possible on the second cut. Again, this has to be weighed against speed.

 

STEP 2

 

Use a billhook, machete, hatchet, two-handed axe or chainsaw to cut a section out of the larger lianas. My preferred tool is the two-handed axe.

 

Obviously, more force must be used to cut the larger lianas than in step 1. Accordingly, more than two strikes will often be necessary, and a heavier tool is better.

 

The liana will be easier to cut the more stable it is. It is often the case that entirely cutting it off at the ground or top first will reduce the stability of the liana for the second cut. This makes it harder to make the second cut, as the liana moves with the force of the strike.

 

Plan for this. One solution is to not entirely sever the liana for the first cut, so enough is left for it to still be stuck to the tree. Then make the second cut, the finish the first.

 

Sometimes you can tell if you entirely sever the top (or bottom), it won’t influence the stability of the liana, but entirely severing the bottom (or top) would. In that case, sever the top (bottom) first.

 

Sometimes it’s best to sever it at the top, bend it to the ground, and then hit it on the ground. You can hold it down with your foot as you strike it, just don’t cut yourself.

 

Care should be taken to not damage the tree, but the level of care is contingent on the type of tree. A redwood is hard to hurt but an alder with thin bark is easy to hurt.

 

For the lower cut, the last blow can be directed downward at a 45 degree angle so the tree will be missed. For the higher cut, you can cut almost all the way through, then finish it with either a more measured blow (perhaps angled more steeply downward) or with a lighter tool like a hand axe or saw. Another thing that can be done is grabbing the liana, bending it at the break, and breaking it off with your hands or by twisting.

 

If using a billhook, machete or hand-axe, a steeper downward blow can be used on the high cut. Doing this repeatedly incrementally cuts away the liana, until a careful last cut completes the sever.

 

Note also that sometimes it may appear to others that you have injured the bark on a tree by girdling the ivy on that tree, even when you haven’t. This is because large ivy lianas often get underneath the bark, and push it out. Large flakes of redwood bark that have been separated from the tree are often suspended in ivy masses. Be careful, these might fall on you when you are working.

 

THINGS TO AVOID

 

Don’t try and pry off the vines or lianas that are stuck to a tree if you can simply grab them at the base of the tree and then pull out.

REASON: this is a waste of time.

 

Don’t compulsively grab more vines further up the tree, and then keep cutting them off higher and higher. Just decide how high you’re going to go, and cut up to there.

REASON: this is a waste of time.

 

Don’t spend tons of time removing lianas that are grafted to the tree.

REASON: this is a waste of time and you can hurt the tree. There may be times when removing lianas is a good idea, like if it looks like a small tree is being strangled. An alternative to removing the lianas is simply cutting them multiple times and leaving them on the tree. Sometimes there is a noticeable release of tension in the liana after it’s been severed, indicating it isn’t strangling the tree anymore.

 

Don’t miss any lianas. This is easy to do. Carefully check the entire tree. Sometimes trees, especially dead snags, have lianas or vines growing up under the bark. This is especially the case for large redwood trees with gaps in their bark that the vines can sneak up. There is often one place the liana is visible and can be severed.

REASON: These sneaky lianas can keep the ivy above the girdle alive.

 

Make sure that there aren’t vines coming down from the tree away from the trunk that are connected to the ground. The tips of these vines sprout roots, and the ivy can get water from the ground that way also. There also cases where ivy vines hanging into streams appear to grow roots that float in the water.

REASON: These vines turned roots can keep the ivy above the girdle alive.

 

You don’t want to only cut the vines high and then leave them on the ground without severing them from their roots. If you’re only going to make one cut, cut as low as possible.

REASON: The vines may grow back up the tree, and then pull all that loose slack up after them.

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Don’t wait for the berries to form, and especially don’t wait for the berries to ripen, before girdling the tree. Seeing umbels is a great way to prioritize targeting. The umbels tell you the ivy berries are coming, but that you still have time to stop them.

REASON: The birds may still eat the berries even if the ivy is going to die soon.

 

VARIANTS OF TECHNIQUE

 

If speed is of the essence, only sever vines and/or lianas once, so you can girdle more trees. Most of the time, you’re going to want to sever each liana in two places to remove a section. But if you are in a remote area it is costly to get to, and you don’t have time to girdle the ivy on each tree in two places, cut corners.

 

Step #2 can be divided into two separate steps. In the first, a hand axe is used on medium sized lianas. In the second, a two-handed axe is used on larger lianas. Or a hand axe can be used high and a two-handed axe can be used low. Or any permutation of the above.

 

If a team is moving through an area, it may be more efficient to have some people do step #1 with billhooks and/or handsaws and other people do step #2 with two-handed axes (or three groups, with billhooks, hand axes, and two-handed axes). This might be especially good if the “heavy” tool is a chainsaw. This strategy also allows the number of tools that have to be carried to be reduced. Not having to switch out tools saves time, but there is then redundancy of movement.

 

Also, having stronger individuals cut the larger lianas may save time. A person of average strength can cut the largest lianas in five minutes or less, but it may take some other individual far longer. However, the speed differential on step #1 may be far smaller for those same two individuals.

 

If a billhook or machete is being used, steps #1 and #2 can be combined. I’d rather use an axe for step #2, a billhook isn’t well suited for thick lianas. However, even if the same tool is used for girdling throughout, it may still be useful to girdle the ivy in two steps. This enables one to see what thick lianas one will have to deal with after clearing the smaller vines, so they can approach them from the best side.

 

For very large lianas, a billhook or machete will take far longer than a two-handed axe or chainsaw, so selectively switching out is another option.

 

HOW THOROUGH SHOULD ONE BE?

 

The discussion in this section bleeds over to the discussion of strategy.

 

How thorough should one be when girdling tree ivy?

This is contingent on the situation but is also something that doesn’t have an obvious answer. It depends how long it takes to get to a site, how many infested trees there are at a site, whether the site can be returned to, etc. All else being equal, the harder it is to get to a site, the more thorough one should be, assuming one has time to do everything there. All else being equal, the more trees one has to do somewhere else, the less thorough one should be.

 

One component of the “how thorough” question is “how much of the roots should one dig out?” Again, this depends on many factors, but it is much more time consuming to dig out roots than to girdle the ivy on a tree. There will often be root-sprout, but if you girdle the fruiting ivy on a tree and leave the roots, it will take at least two years to fruit again.

 

Many trees are surrounded by a pile of duff. The roots in this duff are far easier to pull out and cut than the same roots once they go underground. A compromise between digging out all or none of the roots can be pulling the roots out of the duff but not the soil.

 

Another question is “how high up the tree should one cut the ivy off?” Generally, there aren’t strong reasons to cut higher, but here are two. The first is if the ivy berries are close to fruiting, girdling the ivy low on the tree may not kill the ivy before the berries ripen or form. But if you cut out major lianas further up the tree, that may kill the ivy faster, thus preventing the seeds from ripening. This is pure speculation. The second reason is to make it more obvious that the ivy on the tree has been girdled. It does sometimes waste time to walk to a tree to check if the ivy on it has been girdled when it already has.

 

SPECIAL SITUATION: LARGE STUMP

 

Giant rotting redwood stumps are problematic, as roots can potentially go into the rotting wood for nutrients 25 feet above the ground. If a ladder can be used, try and get on top of the stump and take all the ivy down from the entire stump. To save time, risks can be taken to leave some ivy that appears to have no connection to roots, especially if the ivy can be checked up on. If a ladder isn’t available, cut all the ivy one can from wherever you can reach.

 

SPECIAL SITUATION: DEADFALL

 

A highly problematic situation is a mass of fruiting ivy on a deadfall.

 

Often, when ivy kills a tree and the tree falls, the ivy dies, or most of it dies. This is because the ivy’s connection to the roots was severed by the fall, and the ivy didn’t have time to grow new roots to the ground before it died.

 

However, it is also often the case that the giant ivy lianas do not break, and the ivy thrives. Many of what were branches rub against the ground, and turn into roots. Above these roots more ivy branches sprout and reach for the sky, and the ivy becomes a self-supporting plant that can grow to eight feet tall, albeit with the assistance of the dead tree as its skeleton.

 

The ivy now has the best of both worlds; it has a sunny patch of ground, because the forest has been cleared of a tree and it also has close access to the ground for water. It produces many berries.

 

Killing such ivy is time consuming. You have to cut off every ivy branch and sever all of the lianas that are on the trunk of the dead tree.