they are annuals ..

everything after the first planting .. are seedlings..

you need to remove the vast majority .. BEFORE THEY SEED ... or you will have another million next year ... [and it might be too late for that this year]

its late in sept in z6 .. just start ripping them out ..

and remove all but 2 or 3 next spring.. the leaves are very distinctive ...

ken

It's not possible to "politely" grow MG's next to other plants unless you are able to keep an eye on them, pretty much daily, to make sure they don't strangle other plants by cutting stray shoots or unwrapping/rewrapping them back into place. I agree with Ken, take them out as soon as you see them next spring if they are near other plants.

A plant makes flowers, flowers make seed. And in the case of Morning Glories, flowers make millions of seeds. The only way to prevent seeds is to remove the flowers, which pretty well makes growing them pointless. As beautiful as Morning Glories are, I stopped growing them years ago. It took two or three years of pulling seedlings (before they ever bloomed) to get completely rid of them.

Last year, I planted Cardinal Climber. Darned if it's not exactly like Morning Glories. I have pulled seedlings all summer long. I will allow none to flower ever again, even though they are lovely.....Sigh

Will it do any good to use something like preen? How about round up. I spent the whole year pulling seedlings to no avail. Once I had to stop for two weeks they were everywhere.

I guess the good news is, it's easy to yank them. And I find weeding them very therapeutic, so there you go!

There are parts of my garden that I don't mind them coming up, but as for other areas, once you've had them, it can take years to totally eradicate them. I just find I have to keep yanking the seedlings. They come up very easily.

RoundUp will only kill the vegetative growth of anything in the garden and never affect the dormant seeds. Clearly, if you are going to use an herbicide of some sort, that is NOT the way to go.

Preen or similiar PRE-EMERGENT herbicide is helpful in halting the germination of seeds, but must be applied at the right time and in the proper manner. I don't know if MG is even on the list of plants controlled by trifluralin...you'd have to do some research on that. Your extension office would be a good place to start.

Be sure that you have an excellent understanding of any chemical product before you use it. Actually, before you buy it! You may find out that chemicals are not the way to go.

If the area affected by the MG is relatively small, you could provide a physical barrier of some cardboard, covered by mulch. Of course, you know that you can no longer grow 'a small amount' of this vine.

The bad news is the only answer is vigilance. The good news is if you are vigilant, you have fewer to pull each year. The first two years are the worst. Certainly put down a heavy mulch. That is always the way to supress weeds. Then just pull them every time you see them. That's what I have been doing with Cypress vine. About once a week I have a fresh crop of seedlings, but they are easy to pull and bending over is good for the waistline. :)

In my admittedly limited experience, I've found that one way to have morning glories and not have as much problem with them becoming invasive is to grow them in part sun rather than full sun. You get fewer flowers but still plenty enough to enjoy their shape and color, but they don't seem to go to seed as much.

if you want to give them another try after you pull them all out:

grow them in pots on a deck or cement so when they seed, the seeds have nowhere to grow or self seed except for the pot they are in.

Some varieties are more hardy than others, so they are more aggressive. I've found that the 'Heavenly Blue" are slower to germinate in spring and bloom later than, say, 'Grampa Ott's'. As a result, they don't go to seed as quickly. In my zone I can hardly collect seeds even if I want to. So, you might consider giving them a try.

Martha

Or you could invite the deer into the yard to help keep them under control! I grew a MG this year for the first time, called 'Split Personality'. Very pretty! I don't have a terrible deer problem, but they like to visit the yard and eat a few choice plants, and they decided that MG Split Personality was one of them.

I've grown Cardinal Climber for 4 years now, and the deer had never touched it until this year. The CC has never made a seedling so I hope the MG doesn't either. Maybe the winters are too cold here.