Try roundup for poison ivy plus tough brush.

Cut the vines back close to the ground, but leave several leaves on each vine.

Spray the vine and leaves with the round up.

The roundup will be absorbed into the vine through the leaves and travel to the roots. You must have leaves on the vine to use the roundup.

You may have to spray the vine several times and it may take more than a year to do the entire job, but it should do the job for you.

bbbluz -The description of your flower and the behaviors do not match any MG that I am aware of...

Can you post a photo of any part of your plants (?)

The behavior sounds like Calystegia sepium , but that DOES NOT have a red center.

The red center and elongated heart leaves matches Ipomoea pandurata but that DOES NOT spread bu underground rhizomes.

You may have collected some of both as they are often found growing together.

Try an advanced google image search for both in the exact phrase line and let us know which one you have or if you have both or if you have some other type of plant.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ipomoea panduratain Advanced Google Image Search

One of the Convolvulus, maybe C. equitans? Instead of spraying, you could let your vine drink poison from a jar. Check out kay's instructions's here. Doesn't really matter what kind of vine it is, killing it is the same.

Hi,

Thank you all for responding. I have googled and found the identical vine and blooms it produces. Link below.

Also took a picture of the vine which is not in bloom for comparison of leaves though the forum does not allow PNG extensions. I'll upload it to photobucket and see if I can post from there.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:1342422}}

This is a picture of the vine growing next to my house. It is identical to the one I linked to above. Everytime I pull the vines out of the ground it comes back fast, furious and produces mores vines. When I first tried to dig it up I had to dig at least 2 feet down to get all the roots and find I obviously didn't get them all!

The bit on the other side of the sidewalk could be from a seed that sprouted, just to reconcile what Ron said.

If you're the type who's around and willing to pull any foliage you see about daily, you could win that way if you keep it up longer than the plant can. I try that the first year, and if it doesn't work, anything that will bend into a jar or soda can can use the method I linked. I don't spray stuff anywhere.

Nothing special about this weed or the fact that digging a 2-foot hole didn't kill it. That's why they're weeds, they try to overrule our gardening decisions.

Thank you purpleinopp. I'll try kay's method. I do have cats and do fear for their safety as well. Not many children enter my yard if any at all.

One more question if I may. Will I have to do this for each vine since there are so many of them? I'm assuming there is more than one root system that developed from the seeds as they volunteered them selves.

PS: You can surely bet I'll research the snipping's I bring home from now on!

What a shame you now find this plant to be undesirable. It's much sought after by gardeners who favor native plants and by fans of morning glories. Until recently it wasn't available from commercial sources, and had to be obtained via trading with other gardeners or by searching for it in the wild. Of course, any plant can turn into a pain if its needs aren't taken into consideration before planting it, or if its nature is such that it can't fit into an overly rigid gardening scheme that doesn't allow for improvising and modification of the original garden plan.

A better solution might be to invest a bit of time in trimming the vine, training it to grow horizontally on a structure rather than vertically and/or on the ground, and limiting the number and the placement of the shoots you allow to grow and mature.

bbbluz - Thank you for providing the additional photos which confirm that what you have growing against the house is Ipomoea pandurata.

Ipomoea pandurata has a very large single large root from which many above ground stems will emerge , although aside from the multiple aerial stems which arise from the single large root, it does not spread underground.

There may be the possibility that a runner could have traveled under the sidewalk and 'sprouted' , although it would be an uncommon occurrence.
The stray seed theory may have occurred.

The root has a store of nutrients , although if you keep removing the aerial parts before they get too long , it will eventually exhaust the nutrient supply and the root will die.

Do you have a photo of the part that arose on the other side of the sidewalk (?)...I'm wondering how wide the sidewalk is...3 feet (?)

The Ipomoea pandurata is usually not considered invasive because it is mostly self-infertile and therefore produces few (if any) seeds.

There are many perspectives on what a weed is although my 2 favorite are

1) A weed is anything that you don't want in your garden

2) A weed is a plant whose virtues are as yet unknown - Luther Burbank

Ipomoea pandurata roots have been a source of food for the American Indians for hundreds if not thousands of years...The Cherokee Indians had developed a very palatable strain and traded the roots to white settlers.

Ipomoea in series batatas are all edible except for the seeds.

The alleged toxicity of Morning Glories is greatly exaggerated due to the fact that some have psychoactive alkaloids in the seeds.

I have commented on the alleged toxicity of Morning Glories in many previous threads but will add the links to a select few here

Thread on MG ' toxicity ' to animals and humans
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/vines/msg0712000429469.html

Here is a link that might be useful: Morning Glory Toxicity...facts vs. hyped up Fiction

...overly rigid gardening scheme that doesn't allow for improvising and modification of the original garden plan. This is a strange comment, IMO. bbulz has had this vine for a while and now wants it gone. Most gardeners do a lot of this every year. You've never planted anything you ended up not liking?

...limiting the number and the placement of the shoots you allow to grow and mature. If he/she could or wanted to do that, this post about how to kill this thing wouldn't have come up. People don't dig a 2-ft hole and then change their mind and fall back in love with their "weed."

purpleinopp - Thank you for your time and comments.

I have a somewhat different perspective that I would like to share regarding the following thoughts that you expressed.
"People don't dig a 2-ft hole and then change their mind and fall back in love with their "weed."

I would submit for due consideration that they might if the reason(s) they are / were removing it in the 1st place were based at least partly by a fear of the 'unknown' and so I believe that partially 'unknown' aspect to be relevant and therefore on topic.

Observing how the plant was growing in the pasture may have indicated that it was not overly aggressive in growth , but in a garden setting (without any competition from other plants for space, sunlight and nutrients) wild strains may exhibit enhanced growth as compared to how they grow under 'wild' conditions.

The way in which this particular vine was growing i.e., very fast and possibly spreading underground by showing up on the distal side of a sidewalk ( the depth and width of which the readers do not yet know) , was inspiring fear in the mind of the gardener due to a certain unfamiliarity in which Ipomoea pandurata usually grows.

My personal experience is that I have communicated with others (in the past) who had similar fears regarding Ipomoea pandurata and wanted to remove it ( because they thought it was spreading by underground rhizomes like Calystegia sepium) and after some consideration ultimately decided to allow the plant to remain.

The sidewalk may be very shallow (and / or not very wide) , in which case a runner could have traveled under it and come up on the distal side (mimicking Calystegia rhizomes) and this could understandably spark a type of 'panic' because of the reputation of the Calystegia type of bindweeds.

The fact that the multiple stems arise from a single large root (which is most definitely designed to withstand hard times and is very difficult to dig out) certainly added to a type of 'bindweed panic'.

The additional information provided could have caused a re-consideration of the nature of the plant , allayed any severe fears and the gardener may therefore choose to retain the plant or continue with removal processes however they see most befitting ala their (updated ) perspective.

These threads come up on Google and other search engines and (of course I can only speak for myself) but the responses I supply are intended not just for the fleeting moment , but so that others researching the topic may benefit from whatever is shared at some point in the future.

Thanks to everyone for sharing their questions , suggestions and experience.

regards,

Ron

purpleinopp - this is in reply to your post to me above Ron's most recent post. To anyone reading this thread at some point in the future, Ron makes very good points about the nature of the morning glory the OP is concerned about.

You've never planted anything you ended up not liking?

I've planted annuals which I wound up not liking and made the decision they would never be invited back, but I don't make hasty decisions when it comes to perennials. As far as "limiting the number and the placement of the shoots you allow to grow and mature", this is commonly known as pruning and is done with roses, grapes, and other vining plants.

I live in a harsh high desert climate (hot dry summers, cold dry winters, constant wind, and the soil is alkaline clay over caliche); the previous owner of my house decided to deal with this by modifying the builder's gravel and rocks scheme. He stuck in evergreens and thugs and then called the resulting green mess a garden. He made a number of terrible choices; things I would never have considered planting. Some I've removed because they had only negative qualities, some are on probation until I decide what to replace them with, and because some of them have positive features such as beautiful flowers over a long bloom season, I've decided to work with these by pruning them and/or removing seedlings. Given that I'm limited to what will grow under difficult conditions, compromise is in order in some cases. But yes, I've removed what I see as someone else's poor choice of plants!

When I look at the morning glory vine and it's location, what I see is a plant thriving in a very narrow hellstrip with poor soil; bounded on one side by a house, and the other side by a sidewalk. It's difficult to find a flowering perennial which will do well in this situation. This is why I suggested giving the vine a bit of guidance instead of throwing in the towel and destroying it.

The way to have a garden which requires minimal maintenance is to choose only plants which have one or more of the following characteristics: they're miniatures, are very slow growing, have a predetermined shape such as Italian Cypress, or variegated plants which are less vigorous than the non-variegated forms of their species. Other characteristics that may reduce maintenance would be drought tolerance and lack of seeds and offsets. This is a valid way to plan a garden, but not one I or most people choose.

@musarojo - the true shame is not that I find this beautiful vine undesirable. I can not express in words how much I love vines. When I found this vine I planted it without even researching it's habits. Now I wish I had planted it at the back of my property so it could grow and flourish. It is truly a beautiful vine! Unfortunately, I planted it on the east side of my house and had no idea how strong nor aggressive it could be. I found some of the roots digging themselves into the foundation of my 140+ year old home causing extensive damage. The foundation is an older red brick foundation and the mortor is crumbling presenting cracks. The vine has found it's way under my house into the crawlspace. If not for it's invasiveness, I would not be trying to kill the vine at all. Because of my ignorance a beautiful vine must be destroyed. I have no other option at this time.

@ron convolvulaceae - Thank you kindly for sharing your knowledge. I want to believe that vine that is growing on the other side of the walk, which is about 2 ft wide, is a seed that was left behind and sprouted, yet last year when I crawled under the house into the crawl space some of the runners were 3-4 feet long. At this time the sprout on the other side of the walk is aprroximately 12 inches tall and growing. Also, the ground has a high content of sand which could make it easy for the runners to travel under the walk. I'm going to try to dig it up and plant that specimen at the back of my property where it can grow on a trellis nearby where I have Moon Flowers and many other varieties of Morning Glories and my Passion Vines growing.

I'll get a picture of the "volunteer" tomorrow and post it along with a picture that shows the distance from the "mother" vine to where it is now. Just to let you know, last year it produced so many seed pods that I had to pick them off the vines to prevent the vine from reseeding in the yard nearby as my other Morning Glories had the year before. I sure wish I could get my Canary Vines and Cypress Vines to grow this aggressively! The vine has been "naturalizing" for about 6 years now and it only gets more aggressive as years go by. It must really like my climate, the dirt/sand mixture, east side of the house or me! Haven't decided which just yet!