My advice on experience is to just keep digging it out everytime you see it. Every day, every year. Find out where the ivy is invading and do everthing in your arsenal to get rid of it. It took me three years of pulling and pinching to free myself of the ivy clutch. You don't need sprays. Stay on top of it and speak to your neighbors. Ivy digs deap and will not take NO for an answer. If it's in you neighbor's yard, it's in yours. Better that your neighbor come around and get rid of it than you constantly fighting this beast.

But, I still love ivy in the right place.

Little lambs. A kid will eat ivy too, wouldn't you?
Sorry, but you were asking for it:)

Bonnie,

When I bought my house 2 1/2 years ago, just about half of the half acre was covered in ivy. Growing up trees (lots of them) and harboring all kinds of bugs and varmits.

We used several methods to rid ourselves of the nightmare. At first it seems very overwhelming.

My lot slopes so in the places where it is flat, my husband mowed the ivy several times with the lawn mower. I wasn't happy about it but we did use Roundup out of desperation.

In the areas of slopes where the mower couldn't get to and there is sun, we put down black plastic since these areas were in a half day of intense Southern sun. We weighed the plastic down with bricks and let the sun bake the ivy to death. We didn't use Roundup in these areas in the sun because we didn't need to.

In the sloped areas with shade, we put tons of grass clippings, pine straw (from our own trees) and anything we could collect from the neighbors. We piled it on top of the ivy, probably about 6 inches deep, and smothered it. In these spots, some of the ivy would show up and we'd pull it out by hand.

It has taken us the better part of 2 years to discover these methods and then use them. As a new area was ivy free, we'd move to another area. The soil underneath our ivy, once it's gone, is quite good. My house is almost 60 years old and I believe the ivy was planted when it was new.

Where our property line is against our neighbor's ivy, I just keep cutting it back. As bad as ivy is, I have a bigger battle waging right now with wisteria.

I hope this helps! Don't give up.

bloominganne