get a bottle like the one at the link

fill with 41% roundup ... [which is full strength]

snip EVERY SINGLE thing that pops up from the ground.. and put ONE DROP of roundup on the cutting ... sooner or later.. it will die ...

since you are not aerosolizing the roundup.. there will be NO EFFECT on anything else in the yard ...

this works good on any woody plant ... and is per labeled instructions ... the bottle is the beautiful part of it all though .. lol ... if i say so myself ..

ken

Here is a link that might be useful: link

Everything Ken said plus...

Try to treat all the suckers at one time. If you do a few now, a few more - weeks later, and the rest sometime after that, the treatment is likely to be less effective.

Thanks guys. That seems simple enough and the "designer" bottle is the best part!! When I read that I was already thinking "what is this going to cost?" Too funny!

Thanks Ken! We do have some on hand that is not pre-mixed. Just have to round up a bottle and I'll be ready to go.

Your question takes me back a few years... my old thread on the topic might still be hanging around GW somewhere, who knows. It is a BRUTAL plant to get rid of.

I did it entirely mechanically, which is to say I dug a huge hole and got almost all the roots, and actually left the hole open for a year or two, the better to get at new growth at the source. Eventually I closed it in, and planted on top... mostly all is well but the odd sprout still emerges some 4 years later. I'm vigilant, and snap or cut them as soon as I see them, and eventually, I believe the root will starve. Well, you have to believe in something!

I bow to Ken's superior knowledge of Roundup but just have to say I would try not to use a food bottle, and if you do, wrap duct tape around it or something so the label does not remotely show - the XXXs aren't enough to overcome the message, as I realize every day when I reach for juice and almost grab my husband's identical except for the XXXs bottle of anti-skunk remedy instead :-)

Good luck!

KarinL

I took out a large Quince once for a customer. It put up a heck of a fight, but the John Deere 450 won. Quince roots can really be extensive and deep in sandy soil.
Mike

ya know.. i use it week in and week out .... so i keep it filled ...

but being that you never dilute it.. in theory.. you could just put the remains back in the original bottle for storage.. and properly rinse out the mustard jar...

in 99.99% of the cases.. why leave it in the food bottle ... eh??

i originally tried a dish soap bottle .. but believe it or not.. unlike the viscous soap ... which drips out.. the hole was too big and the roundup just pored out ...

i also use chem proof rubber gloves ... which are also pretty cheap.. also at the bigboxstore or hardware store ...

not your common dish gloves.. but right next to them on the shelf.. they are just thicker.. and a better grade plastic.. or vinyl .. or whatever ...

just because i use a mustard bottle.. does NOT mean i am carefree with anything .... i actually read all the instructions on the package.. go figure on that .. lol .. and using it 100% is a labeled use for killing stumps and woody vines [as i recall]... go figure squared ....

ken

This is an old thread, but I wanted to bring it back because I'm wondering if anyone has used this idea and got terrible results like I did. I tried this method with some old lilac suckers. I trimmed, then individually treated the stems. Guess what! My mother lilac bushes are getting all shrivelly, and the suckers are still coming, and coming and coming. I screwed up big time! So now the damage is done. For all the new suckers I'm going to try a product called Sucker-Stop, but for now I'm hoping for some advice on what to do with my Mother Shrubs. (Incidently, I pruned a couple of years ago because they were really old, and unruly, with alot of dead branches. This is what started the whole sucker deal. I don't recommend EVER pruning old-growth lilacs after this experience.) Will my lilacs "out-grow" the roundup damage? Some branches are super affected, some not-so-much. Should I just prune out the shrively branches (some are enormous) and allow some suckers to grow and replace them? Will the suckering, in response to pruning ever stop, or at least slow down? I've always known lilacs to be suckering, but I had no idea they try to cover acreage!

I tried this method with cottonwood babies that were popping up from nearby trees. It killed the babies, but didn't seem to have any affect on the trees. Some of the larger ones, required repeated applications.

Runswithscissors,

Are you sure you posted to the right thread??? I don't see how you could possibly have taken the advice above as a recommendation to stop suckering from shrubs you wanted to keep!

If you want to discuss the topic of your post, I'd definitely recommend posting it as a new thread, because this thread REALLY wasn't meant to be about stopping suckering!

Thanks Brandon, good advice.

A few questions...Is there any time of year better for doing this? It's early autumn here and I want to eliminate this bugger and its sucker friends so that I won't have to deal with them too badly next year. Is it still doable or should I wait till spring and get them while they want to start growing?

Also, the plant is located between a lilac bush and some blue arborvitae I want to keep, can I safely get rid of the buggers without taking out the others?

Roundup has temperature restrictions and is most effective when the plants are actively growing.

where are you???

plenty of time to do it this fall .... the plants are moving fluids down into the root system ... storing energy ...

in my MI ... probably can be done thru late october ...

above ..... i suggested a drip usage.. there should be no issue about surrounding plants ... IT IS NOT A SPRAY THING ....

even if it fails... you can repeat in spring ....

ken

I'm in Stuttgart, Germany. Even though I don't like to use Roundup willy-nilly, these dang bushes are a nightmare! They grow almost wild around here. People have them because they've encroached from other gardens. Mine were fillet of leftovers from some other tenant. Will definitely drip. You can only get Glyphosate in very small quantities here anyways. Mine is a 100 ml bottle, complete with measuring and diluting incorporated in the bottle. ;)

It should be enough to do the trick. Thanks for the quick feedback. I will get to it this weekend!