I was going to post an enquiry about what size bindweed roots need to be to start growing a new plant... Well I answered my question today...
I dug over the whole plot and finished a couple of weeks ago. Today I was planting some cabbages and I dug out a small Bindweed plant as I dug the hole. To my amazement the new plant was growing from a piece of root i obviously missed when digging... The root is only 40mm long!!
So anyone wanting to rotavate a bad weedy plot beware!!
(http://chat.allotment.org.uk/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=94765.0;attach=25064;image)
They grow from shorter and thinner bit that that :'(
Horrible stuff >:(
I've had a patch of ground covered for a few months. Uncovered it today to find loads of bindweed underneath. i know I'll never get rid of it, but after a few years I've learned to live with it and found that hoeing off the young shoots does help keep it down.
It's reared it's ugly little leaves in my garden this year. I've given it the weed killer in the plastic bag treatment over it's head. Also I've found marestail which has come through from council parks dept. Same treatment and fingers crossed.
Plant very tightly, marestail doesn't like competition. Also a great reason to buy more plants.... ;D
Yes, looks just like the bits I find. however carefully I hand dig and pick out every piece........ I still end up with the 'national collection' of at least 3 different types of bindweed in the garden ;D
We also need to be very careful where these pieces are put, because they survive the compost bin almost unscathed. They need to be killed by drying them out or by drowning them before composting. A right pest. Once they start winding around plants, it gets really difficult, because if I try and pull them out, they will just take the plant with them :(
Now I read that they are related to sweet potato. Why on earth does not some boffin make a cross and we get an edible, winterhardy sweet potato out of it. The rate at which the stuff grows here and in many other places, we could end world hunger in a season ;D and get something worthwhile for all the digging.
I'd say that 75% of the weeds on our plot are bindweed, it pops up through the thickest of mulches, spreads under any pot or plastic left on the ground but I guess is one of the easiest ones to pull up with long stem / roots. A few days later it's back in the same spot again and I sometimes feel like I'm pruning it and making it stronger for its next appearance :( I've just learnt to live with it but there is a great satisfaction in extracting a particularly long one.
Yes, it's the main weed I have too. I have given up trying to dig it out, it's a waste of time. It does seem to grow almost without light. I just pull it out as it grows. If it is getting around plants, feel around the base and pull up the roots of the bind weed but don't try taking it off the plant (as you see, it pulls off teh plant's leaves or the whole stem). It will shrivel up and drop off once uprooted.
Yes hoeing it does work, it will grow back but it only grows from May to September so just keep at it during that time and the rest of the season you'll be ok.
WE have it both at home and on the lottie.
At home it was thriving in a flower border so we dug out all the plants,grassed it and a couple of years of mowing seems to have donethe trick.
I remeber Geoff Hamilton (r.i.p.) saying he dug up a root ,nailed it to his shed door for 2 years in all weathers then planted it in a pot and the flippin thing grew :o
Newly aquired allotment was heavily infested with bindweed but using ROUNDUP in a small spray or mixed with wall paper paste and painted on for accuracy, plus a bit of patience cleared it all. Now into third season and no sign of it this year.
Quote from: macmac on May 30, 2012, 09:29:31
I remeber Geoff Hamilton (r.i.p.) saying he dug up a root ,nailed it to his shed door for 2 years in all weathers then planted it in a pot and the flippin thing grew :o
Which is odd cos I throw it by the bucket load into the dalek composter fresh out the ground and it dies 99% of the time. Any survivers get a second go. Same for couch,dock and dandelion.
Oh yes...plenty of the 'spagetti weed' here too.. ::) I was thinking other day when digging some roots out that I should do little growing test with them.. ::)...cutting some roots into different lenghts and potting them up to see how small pieces will still take off and what is optimum size for best regeneration.. ::)..but then I thought I have better things to do with my time...it would be interesting though.
I find the roots die out easily enough once exposed to sun and they soon dry out...but trying to get all out of the soil is virtually impossible..well..on my site it is..it grows everywhere..in hedgerows..under permanent paths...so it can be only tamed into certain extent and managed but never get rid of.
I have to admit that the big flowered hedge bindweed is beautiful when it flowers...AND...I've even seen some honeybees on the bindweed flowers so suppose its not that bad.
I read that they are related to sweet potato. Why on earth does not some boffin make a cross and we get an edible, winterhardy sweet potato out of it
;D..wonderful idea.. ;D I just wonder if they are closely enough related for crossing. I would love to be that 'boffin' and able to make a new edible...but I'm not even able to grow sweetpotato well enough for a tubers, never mind producing some flowers for seeds.. ::)
You can get rid of it, by repeatedly digging it out. You've got to be ruthless, and keep digging every bit you see out, a couple of times a season if possible, but you do get there.
I have masses of it, if it was edible we would be well fed! ;)
I've got it in my newly aquired greenhouse :'(. It's amazing how quickly it shoots up from the tiniest root.
Bindweed is a b****r!
Our neighbours appear not to notice it clambering over everything left untouched in their garden - (that's most things). It winds its way into ours. :(
When spotted hurtling over the fence we've always cut it and thrown it back - also unnoticed by our neighbours. ::)
It frequently snuck under the fence so we had a 24" concrete gravel-board sunk into the ground leaving a foot exposed when the new fence went up. This hasn't stopped it either... it squeezes between the fence panels and the concrete pillars. >:(
Yours, totally fed-up with neighbour's pure neglect. :(
Aden
Good luck with getting rid of it. My new allotment has patches of it coming up. It's the thinner rooted field bindweed I think,t he one with the smaller sweet scented flowers. I'm concentrating on the horsetail at the moment. I dug up 83 stems of it this morning to dry up but I'll tackle the bindweed next. In Gibraltar and southern Spain there is a magnificent deepest purple version of bindweed. I could almost, almost live with that.
I thought I dug it all out last year but no, its popping up again so this time I am using a little squirt of round up. Just got to be patient while round up does its work. So tempting to get at that long root. Thank goodness it isn`t hard to dig that type of root
Amen to it being annoying...we had pretty much dug every piece we could see out of our section of the plot were currently working on. We left the allotment alone for a month or so when it was raining everyday...came back and it was absolutely everywhere again!
Still 2 weeks later and I think we have it under control again! *fingers crossed*
Cant wait to have to tackle the next section of the allotment. its been under a sheet for 4 months or thereabouts, so hopefully the weeds are a least a little weakened...