Brambles

[taff..]

How the 'eck do you get rid of brambles?

My garden hedge is about 100ft long and has been rather neglected over the last few years so has become rather overgrown, I've just spent a few hours (again) going through it chopping it down to about 5ft high and I cant believe how wild the brambles have gone, its bonkers.

all I've done is cut them off at ground level and pulled them out but I know they are just going to grow back again so I need something a bit more permanaent

Behind my garden is about 1/2 acre of wasteland that is covered in brambles and nettles and to the left is a gert big allotment, just thought I'd pop that in because I'm sure someone will be thinking 'but they are good for the wildlife........'

 

[Chris B]

A goat?
Or do they just eat things they aren't supposed to?

 

[jean]

Actually, goats are very selective.They might just about eat the leaves, if there's nothing else around that they prefer.

 

[Frisbee]

It's no use cutting them off at ground level, you will have to dig them out if you really want rid of them.

Because of the ones behind your garden you will always get them creeping through, but once you have cleared the main roots a bramble & brushwood weedkiller will keep on top of any future encroachment. If you don't want to use weedkiller you'll just have to keep on digging.

Frisbee

 

[taff..]

It's no use cutting them off at ground level, you will have to dig them out if you really want rid of them.

Because of the ones behind your garden you will always get them creeping through, but once you have cleared the main roots a bramble & brushwood weedkiller will keep on top of any future encroachment. If you don't want to use weedkiller you'll just have to keep on digging.

Frisbee

cheers, I thought as much tbh.

it is really going to be mission impossible as next door hasn't even cut his grass for the last couple of years so his garden is going to be over run unless he does something this year, his bamboo is starting to encroach at the bottom of my garden as well .

I'm not keen on using weedkiller because it is all entwined in the hedge and I dont really want to kill the hedge.

On the up side I've just found the wild strawberry has spread nicely around the back of the greenhouse, the fruit off them is tiny yet soo sweet

 

[victor meldrew]

The bees will love the brambles, if an option leave well alone .

John

 

[taff..]

The bees will love the brambles, if an option leave well alone .

John

Behind my garden is about 1/2 acre of wasteland that is covered in brambles and nettles and to the left is a gert big allotment, just thought I'd pop that in because I'm sure someone will be thinking 'but they are good for the wildlife........'

yes, I've already covered that in the OP

 

[MJBee]

I had the same problem with the southern boundary of my garden. The adjoining land had not been touched for years and the brambles had taken over. In the winter I cleared a strip 3m wide and burnt the cuttings. The following spring and summer I strimmed the strip once a month. The next year there were only a few new shoots to strim and by the end of the season they had given up. It takes time and you have to keep at it but it is possible without chemicals.
On the other side of the strip the brambles are about 10 feet high and the bees love them the resulting blackberries are useless small dry and seedy
Mike

 

[hedgerow pete]

one way of dealing with them is the same as the dread jalanise knottweed and that after you have cut a single stem at almost floor level use a syring to drip some weed killer into the stem, no needle please just drips , weed killer from b+q round up stuff mix it at 50 to 1. use weed killer but with out the mess and killing every thing else,

 

[taff..]

one way of dealing with them is the same as the dread jalanise knottweed and that after you have cut a single stem at almost floor level use a syring to drip some weed killer into the stem, no needle please just drips , weed killer from b+q round up stuff mix it at 50 to 1. use weed killer but with out the mess and killing every thing else,

Thats a good idea, I've got some roundup in the shed.

 

[hedgerow pete]

any time you want to kill something give us a shout,
and unlike the others if it was me i would burn the lot off , there are better things to grow for the bees to feed off than poor quality scabby brambles

 

[taff..]

any time you want to kill something give us a shout,
and unlike the others if it was me i would burn the lot off , there are better things to grow for the bees to feed off than poor quality scabby brambles

thats just made me

I've spent all day putting a garden full of hedge cuttings through a shredder and I took particular pleasure in feeding the brambles into it

Are you in gardening type business then?

 

[mikethebee]

To stop the hedge from growing spray and keep in trim, I fill up a kitchen spray bottle with red diesel and on a hot day in the morning walk round give it a spraying the stems seem to cringe away and die in a day and not want to come back.
Don’t do it when in flower.

 

[hedgerow pete]

i am a hairy builder but have spent several years working with a friend when he gets too busy durring the year and he does pest control and wood worm stuff,