Rhus typhina - sucker problems?
Rachel Bodle
Just this month my father has given up on the much admired Rhus typhina at the
edge of his front lawn (Preston area, severely drought affected last year, fairly
thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth between
flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace the
tree.
Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
I have a younger version of the same tree in my small London garden so I'm VERY
keen to tap into the experience of the group here!
TIA
--
Rachel Bodle (rac...@hanwell.demon.co.uk)
Nick Maclaren
In article <799883...@hanwell.demon.co.uk>, Rachel Bodle <rac...@hanwell.demon.co.uk> writes:
|> Just this month my father has given up on the much admired Rhus typhina at the
|> edge of his front lawn (Preston area, severely drought affected last year, fairly
|> thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth between
|> flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
|> appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace the
|> tree.
|>
|> Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
I don't know, but I got rid of ours for the same reason! It was
actually demolishing our drive - 1/2" of tarmac on top of a FULL
3" of hardcore! We have since replaced the drive, too :-)
But my in-laws have quite an old one that doesn't cause trouble.
My guess is that it is soil dependent, and it may sucker less on
clay - but that is just a wild guess.
Nick Maclaren,
University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Email: nm...@cam.ac.uk
Tel.: +44 1223 334761 Fax: +44 1223 334679
Phil Whitehead
> Just this month my father has given up on the much admired Rhus typhina at the
> edge of his front lawn (Preston area, severely drought affected last year, fairly
> thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth between
> flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
> appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace the
> tree.
>
> Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
>
> TIA
> --
> Rachel Bodle (rac...@hanwell.demon.co.uk)
The Gardening Guru on Radio Kent had a fitover a listener wanting to plant
one of theses trees and warned her of the suckering habit of this tree.
Unfortunately his advice was 5 years to late for me and even on heavy clay
mine is sickering like mad . The neighbours now have one(a sucker from
mine) and Ihave a feeling that two doors down are now growing one!
It does give a super display in the autumn though .
phil whitehead
Chris Boulby
Whitehead <p_whi...@icrf.icnet.uk> writes
I hate to alarm you both further, but these suckers travel great
distances depending on the variety you are growing. They are weeds in
Canada and I'd never put them in a garden come what may. I'd worry if a
neighbour half a mile away got one! The *only* way to rid yourself of
them now is to laboriously glyphosate them again and again.
--
Chris Boulby
Rachel Bodle
In article: <BN0YDLAH...@coniston.demon.co.uk> Chris Boulby
<ch...@coniston.demon.co.uk> writes:
>
<snip - lots of suckering horror stories>
>
> I hate to alarm you both further, but these suckers travel great
> distances depending on the variety you are growing. They are weeds in
> Canada and I'd never put them in a garden come what may. I'd worry if a
> neighbour half a mile away got one! The *only* way to rid yourself of
> them now is to laboriously glyphosate them again and again.
Still wondering whether to remove the young rhus typhina in my small London
garden I had a hunt through the books this weekend and found little
encouragement there. I found wise words along the lines that the tree shouldn't be
planted in a lawn because grass cutting may damage fine surface roots and
encourage suckering. I also discovered that the tree shouldn't be planted in a
border where the roots may get pronged when you're forking around. I then found
an illustration of the tree with the caption 'Stag's horn sumach ... makes a low
flat-topped tree, much given to suckering and forming a thicket.'
I don't want a thicket! Yesterday we uprooted the tree and put it in a large pot. Its
been told that if it wants to stay alive it'd better learn to like the pot because there's
no way its going back in the garden. Now we're standing by with the glyphosate for
any rataliatory action from missed root segments!
Dave JW Day
Chris Boulby <ch...@coniston.demon.co.uk> wrote some interesting stuff
in <BN0YDLAH...@coniston.demon.co.uk>...
>In article <p_whitehead-...@mac054013.lif.icnet.uk>, Phil
>Whitehead <p_whi...@icrf.icnet.uk> writes
>>In article <799883...@hanwell.demon.co.uk>, Rachel Bodle
>><rac...@hanwell.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> Just this month my father has given up on the much admired Rhus typhina at
>the
>>> edge of his front lawn
> A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth
> I hate to alarm you both further, but these suckers travel great
>distances depending on the variety you are growing.
but how deep do they go?
mine seem to be only just below the surface and are easy to pull out.
(I don't mind a bit of suckering)
d
--
========== da...@stejonda.demon.co.uk ========== Orpington ============
PGP Key available from public key-servers - Key ID : C61E6331
"Whatever you do will be insignificant,
but it is very important that you do it." --Mahatma Gandhi
Clarke Brunt
In Article <799883...@hanwell.demon.co.uk> Rachel Bodle writes:
>Just this month my father has given up on the much admired Rhus typhina at the
>thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth between
>flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
>appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace the
>tree.
>
>Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
I've seen specimens grown in lawns with no suckers at all, but once it
starts, there seems to be no stopping it. I get the impression that breaking
off the suckers, or snapping or damaging roots near the surface just
encourages it to sucker even more.
When I decided that mine had to go, it wasn't much problem. Once the main
tree was removed, I still got some sporadic suckers (in the pavement,
in the road etc!) but they were soon eliminated with weedkiller and
hand pulling.
--
Clarke Brunt (cla...@brunt.demon.co.uk)
Andy Mabbett
In article <6anI$AAl09...@stejonda.demon.co.uk>, Dave JW Day
<da...@stejonda.demon.co.uk> writes
>(I don't mind a bit of suckering)
Kindly restrict posts about such habits to alt.pervy.stuff
Thank you.
--
Andy Mabbett
(personal view only - *not* my employers!)
Chris Boulby
>in <BN0YDLAH...@coniston.demon.co.uk>...
>>In article <p_whitehead-...@mac054013.lif.icnet.uk>, Phil
>>Whitehead <p_whi...@icrf.icnet.uk> writes
>>>In article <799883...@hanwell.demon.co.uk>, Rachel Bodle
>>><rac...@hanwell.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>the
>>>> edge of his front lawn
>> A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth
>> I hate to alarm you both further, but these suckers travel great
>>distances depending on the variety you are growing.
><snip>
>
>but how deep do they go?
>
>mine seem to be only just below the surface and are easy to pull out.
>
are pulling out is a sucker, ie it has come all the way from the parent
plant. Unless you get every scrap of the sucker all the way back to the
root of the parent plant you are multiplying further suckers growth and
without knowing it you are actually increasing the problem. Eventually
that new underground growth will become woody and more and more
difficult to remove. If you have acres of land it is no problem at all,
just dig out more and more lawn to accommodate it. If you have a normal
sized garden, however, you are looking at trouble, unless you want a
thicket of Rhus of course.
>
>d
>
--
Chris Boulby
Chris Boulby
In article <kbhk...@brunt.demon.co.uk>, Clarke Brunt
<cla...@brunt.demon.co.uk> writes
>fairly
>>thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth
>between
>>flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
>>appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace
>the
>>tree.
>>
>>Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
>
>I've seen specimens grown in lawns with no suckers at all, but once it
>starts, there seems to be no stopping it. I get the impression that breaking
>off the suckers, or snapping or damaging roots near the surface just
>encourages it to sucker even more.
If it is growing under pavement of any sort, it has a habit of breaking
through it. I have seen them merrily growing right through a tarmac
path on our old street. I am not being silly here, just telling the
truth about what I have seen. There may well be some which do not have
this habit, but the ones I have seen grown hereabouts do.
>
>When I decided that mine had to go, it wasn't much problem. Once the main
>tree was removed, I still got some sporadic suckers (in the pavement,
>in the road etc!) but they were soon eliminated with weedkiller and
>hand pulling.
Repeated dressings of glyphosate do seem to do the trick, but you have
to watch for quite some time, and I don't recommend this as a means of
control, just eradication. If you have the parent tree still there I
doubt glyphosate would kill that, and eventually the problem would
repeat.
>
--
Chris Boulby
Susan Wontroba
>edge of his front lawn (Preston area, severely drought affected last year, fairly
>thin top soil). A forest of suckers in the lawn, as well as strong growth between
>flags, against the walls of the house, and nightmares of finding new suckers
>appearing in the sitting room overnight, have led him to a decision to replace the
>tree.
>
>Was this inevitable - or could the problem have been avoided?
>
>keen to tap into the experience of the group here!
>
Both my father and I used to grow these as they are very attractive but
there appears to be no way to avoid the problem with suckers, in our
experience anyway. When we moved house I decide not to grow one here as
they were impossible to get rid of at the old house. Dad now grows his in a
large container. I might try that some time.
--
Sue Wontroba, Stade Computers Limited. phone: (+44) 121 373 9546
Mail in...@accu.org for information about the Association of C and C++ Users
or see <http://bach.cis.temple.edu/accu>
maxine...@gmail.com
Fact is I now have suckers popping up all over the lawn and towards the house (it's ranged about 15 ft from the original tree which last winter I cut back to a stump.... but that set it into survival mode and its voracious suckering commenced. I have a further smaller one (5ft) - which I appear to have succesfully seen off using a weed killer (on the leaves).
I shall be using the same method (weed killer) on the larger tree bark and leaves - and also spending a good week digging every single last root of this invasive. Will let folks know how long it takes to see off completely/progress on the eradication!
David
> also try a stump-killer such as Root-Out (technically, ammonium
> sulphamate) http://tinyurl.com/y8jwzht4 Drill a few deep holes into
> the original Rhus stump and spoon in crystals of the stuff, and cover
> with a tile or poly bag tied around with twine to keep the rain out.
>
Or drill the holes and inject Roundup/Glyphosate ( diluted 4parts water
to 1 of Glyphosate
Martin Brown
> On Wed, 9 Aug 2017 10:23:36 -0700 (PDT), maxine...@gmail.com
> wrote:
>
> also try a stump-killer such as Root-Out (technically, ammonium
> sulphamate) http://tinyurl.com/y8jwzht4 Drill a few deep holes into
> the original Rhus stump and spoon in crystals of the stuff, and cover
> with a tile or poly bag tied around with twine to keep the rain out.
adding a trace of copper sulphate also speeds up the rotting process
(paradoxically by inhibiting anti fungal enzymes in the live wood)
Regular mowing and/or Verdone weeds in lawn treatment will see off the
suckers but there is a lot of stored energy in old tree roots and it may
well persist for a season or two before it expires completely.
--
Regards,
Martin Brown