For the tree stumps I would treat with brushwood killer/stump killer and then I'd put a black bin liner over the stump, tying it in place and forget about it for a year. The brambles, bindweed etc you already have good advice for - keep being persistent but be careful when applying glyphosate or any other weedkiller that you don't get it on your crops - the bindweed may take several doses but you can be sure your crops just need one drop to keel over!
Ok, my first post. We have this all over our lawn and garden, so I was going to come here looking for advice...but instead I will share the research I have done so far. First, they are not called marestails when they are on land, they are called horsetails. They are two different types of plants. None of the suggestions above will work. Sorry folks, but that was not the best advice. The roots go far deeper than any herbicide will be able to reach. Glyphosate won't work. Glyphosate actually encourages field horsetail by eliminating competing plants. Horsetails love poor drainage, low oxygen, and acidic soil. You need to improve your soil by applying lime. After AT LEAST two weeks, apply horse manure. Then some nice compost. I've tried killing them with industrial grade vinegar (20%) but, like anything applied to them, it will only kill the tops and do nothing for the roots (which can go as far down as 7 meters...or over to Japan). Also, it acidifies the soil. Covering any parts of your garden with membrane or plastic will just make the roots really happy without the oxygen and horsetails will pop out everywhere along the sides. Don't do it. That's what the previous owner did here. You lift up the sheet of plastic and it is nothing but horsetail roots under there. They don't like shade so you can crowd some of them out with taller plants. From March to May you must be very vigilant and pull out any female (asparagus looking) horsetails as soon as possible as they spread thousands of spores everywhere. Do not till as it will make things worse. Every bit of root will regenerate into a new plant. We need to realise that they may never, ever fully go away. They take a lot of silicone from your soil so you can compost them after drying them out in order the replace the silicone. Try to improve your drainage by sloping the land away from your property and adding some ditches for the water to flow down. Whew. So, that is what I know. Some simply say it is best to pull out what you can and then just deal with them. The roots go so far down that they don't compete too much with plants for nutrients (allegedly) and the best thing to do is encourage them to move along by improving the soil. Very hard to do if your neighbour has them.
The plot has laid fallow for several years and was covered in black plastic with stuff growing through were the plastic had become displaced by wind. The land has good drainage though, prehaps to good as it's on a slope. It's getting lot's of oxygen having never been dug over for years and there are worms in the soil although it's not teeming with them.
Interestingly enough the horsestail is coming up where the plastic was, bindweed is coming up in the exposed sites.
More by accident than design I've double dug in mushroom compost on some beds and this contains lime to stop the mushrooms from growing. Drinkwaters Farm is local and I was thinking of asking if they give their compost away . It would improve the soil and also kill the horsetail.
I was aiming to retain some of the water in the soil with the compost before it drained off but am I right in thinking according to your research Autumn dh the lime will help slow down horsetail but retaining water will encourage it
As I'd planned to use roundup on the bindweed, three approaches with the horsestail wouldn't hurt, weedkiller, lime compost and pulling out...
On a positive note there must be a family of slow worms living at the bottom of the plot, another one ventured out from the pile of stuff down there to watch me digging over the soil yesterday.
Thanks for the link Dove, guess I won't be using creosote
Sorry, Autumn, but in the midlands area of England, Equisetum arvense is often called marestail. The RHS acknowledges this on its website. I think that shows the importance of using latin binomial system, then we all know what we are talking about.
There is no way I would add it to a compost heap, as the tiniest bit will regrow.
My mother has been battling it for over 55 years. It comes through tarmac, and it doesn't matter how much its pulled it still comes back. She has free draining neutral sandy soil. The only cure we have found is stamping on it and then spraying with glyphosate.
Doesn't matter if people mistakenly call it mare's tail, it is still horsetail. Horsetail is not Hippuris vulgaris, Mare's tail is (as you already know).
Would never compost a female, but the male's leaves and stem...after drying them out (as stated above) in the sun first...are not going to regenerate from death, come back to life, and repopulate after composting. They spread through roots and female spores.
Autumn , of course it's your garden to do as you wish with.
However, even articles on the internet can contain mistaken information - I see that the link you've given us refers to this plant as 'Mares tail' and as you've told us, that's wrong ...........
The naming of plants is a minefield - people named plants before names were ever written down. This is why the Linnaean system and the taxonomies that developed from it are so widely used to avoid confusion - every plant has a recorded Latin name.
However this does not mean that regional common names are 'mistakes' - they are colloquial names and have validity and value - for example, English literature would be so much poorer without the traditional regional names for plants.
To return to the matter in hand, you have told us that you still have Horsetail infesting your garden, so I take it that the techniques you advocate have not yet worked.
Several others have written of their personal experience of establishing an acceptable degree of control using glyphosate.
In gardening there are many paths ............................
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I am an English teacher, but thanks on trying to educate me on colloquialisms.
Colloquialisms are informal. Calling it a colloquial, I have no problem with. Saying that a horsetail is a mare's tail and that is it's name...and not just what you call it...is what I have a problem with. I could go around calling roses daffodils and just tell people it is a colloquialism, but that would be a bit ridiculous. Looking at the Wikipedia page, there is not mention of mare's tail (I didn't edit it, I swear!) and I've gardened in three countries that use the term horse tail.
When doing searches on how to combat the horsetail, wouldn't the searches be more effective and garner better results if people used the proper name rather than the colloquial? Maybe by correcting the use of the word in its colloquial form, as I did, one could find more options for control?
Maybe you should update the Wiki page with your colloquialism. Might get shot down by the editors however.
Wouldn't put glyphosate anywhere, ever. Will never advocate that anyone does so. Also, I have never seen any proof that it works on the horsetails. The great majority of gardening professionals state that no current weedkiller will work on the horsetails. I tend to go with them. If someone here can show me before and after photos year after year after using glysophate, then I'd love to see that. I really would. I'd also like to know how glysophate kills roots 5 meters deep. I tried it when I lived in Japan to no avail because I had difficulty reading some of the labels, I had no idea I was using it at the time.
You are right though, there are many paths. I just can't believe people have such a problem with someone chiming in and saying something other than "Put glysophate on there".
Sorry if I sound rude. Just spent the month pulling out female horsetails from lawn, digging out the turf by hand and applying lime late last night. This was after extensive research on ways to combat this. It is frustrating that these were not disclosed to us by the previous owner. It is frustrating to be told they will never go away. It is frustrating that there is no requirement to disclose this sort of infestation.
It was even more frustrating to come here and get the most terrible welcome from three of your users when they decided to call me a muppet, someone else, and a WUM for posting solutions to horsetail problems in the forum where people where people ask for solutions to horsetail problems.
iGrow...yes, I suggested drying out first, but no one listens to me...
Glyphosate is suggested for perennials with deep roots because it is translocated within the plant. It is systemic as opposed to contact. It travels to the roots. The difficulty is in getting it to sink in to a plant with a high level of silica. This is achieved by breaking up the stems by trampling on them or bashing with a rake.
have a look at the RHS website, I prefer to take their advice rather than wikipedia.
Serious question here. Does the RHS have links to Monsanto by any chance? They are a charity and not a scientific organization, so do they receive donations from Monsanto?
I could post a thousand links where people say Roundup doesn't work, but you can Google that too.
Wikepedia, the page about horsetails, does not offer advice on eradication. So, I was not suggesting that anyone use that page to go for answers on eradication, just the names.
If the roundup is going down into the roots...where does it go from there? Can it not hurt your bulbs and root systems of other plants upon decomposition?
The fact that the RHS doesn't even mention lime or drainage when Monsanto does is troubling. There is not a lot of information about Horsetails on that RHS page. The fact that they don't mention removal of the female stems and immediate disposal of them is also strange.
Posts
For the tree stumps I would treat with brushwood killer/stump killer and then I'd put a black bin liner over the stump, tying it in place and forget about it for a year. The brambles, bindweed etc you already have good advice for - keep being persistent but be careful when applying glyphosate or any other weedkiller that you don't get it on your crops - the bindweed may take several doses but you can be sure your crops just need one drop to keel over!
Ok, my first post. We have this all over our lawn and garden, so I was going to come here looking for advice...but instead I will share the research I have done so far. First, they are not called marestails when they are on land, they are called horsetails. They are two different types of plants. None of the suggestions above will work. Sorry folks, but that was not the best advice. The roots go far deeper than any herbicide will be able to reach. Glyphosate won't work. Glyphosate actually encourages field horsetail by eliminating competing plants. Horsetails love poor drainage, low oxygen, and acidic soil. You need to improve your soil by applying lime. After AT LEAST two weeks, apply horse manure. Then some nice compost. I've tried killing them with industrial grade vinegar (20%) but, like anything applied to them, it will only kill the tops and do nothing for the roots (which can go as far down as 7 meters...or over to Japan). Also, it acidifies the soil. Covering any parts of your garden with membrane or plastic will just make the roots really happy without the oxygen and horsetails will pop out everywhere along the sides. Don't do it. That's what the previous owner did here. You lift up the sheet of plastic and it is nothing but horsetail roots under there. They don't like shade so you can crowd some of them out with taller plants. From March to May you must be very vigilant and pull out any female (asparagus looking) horsetails as soon as possible as they spread thousands of spores everywhere. Do not till as it will make things worse. Every bit of root will regenerate into a new plant. We need to realise that they may never, ever fully go away. They take a lot of silicone from your soil so you can compost them after drying them out in order the replace the silicone. Try to improve your drainage by sloping the land away from your property and adding some ditches for the water to flow down. Whew. So, that is what I know. Some simply say it is best to pull out what you can and then just deal with them. The roots go so far down that they don't compete too much with plants for nutrients (allegedly) and the best thing to do is encourage them to move along by improving the soil. Very hard to do if your neighbour has them.
The plot has laid fallow for several years and was covered in black plastic with stuff growing through were the plastic had become displaced by wind. The land has good drainage though, prehaps to good as it's on a slope. It's getting lot's of oxygen having never been dug over for years and there are worms in the soil although it's not teeming with them.
Interestingly enough the horsestail is coming up where the plastic was, bindweed is coming up in the exposed sites.
More by accident than design I've double dug in mushroom compost on some beds and this contains lime to stop the mushrooms from growing. Drinkwaters Farm is local and I was thinking of asking if they give their compost away
. It would improve the soil and also kill the horsetail.
I was aiming to retain some of the water in the soil with the compost before it drained off but am I right in thinking according to your research Autumn dh the lime will help slow down horsetail but retaining water will encourage it
As I'd planned to use roundup on the bindweed, three approaches with the horsestail wouldn't hurt, weedkiller, lime compost and pulling out...
On a positive note there must be a family of slow worms living at the bottom of the plot, another one ventured out from the pile of stuff down there to watch me digging over the soil yesterday.
Thanks for the link Dove, guess I won't be using creosote
Sorry, Autumn, but in the midlands area of England, Equisetum arvense is often called marestail. The RHS acknowledges this on its website. I think that shows the importance of using latin binomial system, then we all know what we are talking about.
There is no way I would add it to a compost heap, as the tiniest bit will regrow.
My mother has been battling it for over 55 years. It comes through tarmac, and it doesn't matter how much its pulled it still comes back. She has free draining neutral sandy soil. The only cure we have found is stamping on it and then spraying with glyphosate.
Doesn't matter if people mistakenly call it mare's tail, it is still horsetail. Horsetail is not Hippuris vulgaris, Mare's tail is (as you already know).
http://hotbincomposting.wordpress.com/2012/09/21/can-i-compost-horsetail-mares-tail-or-equisetum-arvense/
Would never compost a female, but the male's leaves and stem...after drying them out (as stated above) in the sun first...are not going to regenerate from death, come back to life, and repopulate after composting. They spread through roots and female spores.
Autumn
, of course it's your garden to do as you wish with.
However, even articles on the internet can contain mistaken information - I see that the link you've given us refers to this plant as 'Mares tail' and as you've told us, that's wrong ...........
The naming of plants is a minefield - people named plants before names were ever written down. This is why the Linnaean system and the taxonomies that developed from it are so widely used to avoid confusion - every plant has a recorded Latin name.
However this does not mean that regional common names are 'mistakes' - they are colloquial names and have validity and value - for example, English literature would be so much poorer without the traditional regional names for plants.
To return to the matter in hand, you have told us that you still have Horsetail infesting your garden, so I take it that the techniques you advocate have not yet worked.
Several others have written of their personal experience of establishing an acceptable degree of control using glyphosate.
In gardening there are many paths ............................
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I am an English teacher, but thanks on trying to educate me on colloquialisms.
Colloquialisms are informal. Calling it a colloquial, I have no problem with. Saying that a horsetail is a mare's tail and that is it's name...and not just what you call it...is what I have a problem with. I could go around calling roses daffodils and just tell people it is a colloquialism, but that would be a bit ridiculous. Looking at the Wikipedia page, there is not mention of mare's tail (I didn't edit it, I swear!) and I've gardened in three countries that use the term horse tail.
When doing searches on how to combat the horsetail, wouldn't the searches be more effective and garner better results if people used the proper name rather than the colloquial? Maybe by correcting the use of the word in its colloquial form, as I did, one could find more options for control?
Maybe you should update the Wiki page with your colloquialism. Might get shot down by the editors however.
Wouldn't put glyphosate anywhere, ever. Will never advocate that anyone does so. Also, I have never seen any proof that it works on the horsetails. The great majority of gardening professionals state that no current weedkiller will work on the horsetails. I tend to go with them. If someone here can show me before and after photos year after year after using glysophate, then I'd love to see that. I really would. I'd also like to know how glysophate kills roots 5 meters deep. I tried it when I lived in Japan to no avail because I had difficulty reading some of the labels, I had no idea I was using it at the time.
You are right though, there are many paths. I just can't believe people have such a problem with someone chiming in and saying something other than "Put glysophate on there".
Sorry if I sound rude. Just spent the month pulling out female horsetails from lawn, digging out the turf by hand and applying lime late last night. This was after extensive research on ways to combat this. It is frustrating that these were not disclosed to us by the previous owner. It is frustrating to be told they will never go away. It is frustrating that there is no requirement to disclose this sort of infestation.
It was even more frustrating to come here and get the most terrible welcome from three of your users when they decided to call me a muppet, someone else, and a WUM for posting solutions to horsetail problems in the forum where people where people ask for solutions to horsetail problems.
iGrow...yes, I suggested drying out first, but no one listens to me...
fidgetbones...they love sandy soil.
Glyphosate is suggested for perennials with deep roots because it is translocated within the plant. It is systemic as opposed to contact. It travels to the roots. The difficulty is in getting it to sink in to a plant with a high level of silica. This is achieved by breaking up the stems by trampling on them or bashing with a rake.
have a look at the RHS website, I prefer to take their advice rather than wikipedia.
https://apps.rhs.org.uk/advicesearch/Profile.aspx?pid=257
Serious question here. Does the RHS have links to Monsanto by any chance? They are a charity and not a scientific organization, so do they receive donations from Monsanto?
Just looked at Monsanto's page (they correct people that use the term mare's tail and suggest applying lime, drainage, and cutting (maybe that is what works instead of the roundup?) http://www.monsanto-ag.co.uk/content.output/172/172/Roundup/Difficult%20Weeds/Horsetail.mspx
I could post a thousand links where people say Roundup doesn't work, but you can Google that too.
Wikepedia, the page about horsetails, does not offer advice on eradication. So, I was not suggesting that anyone use that page to go for answers on eradication, just the names.
If the roundup is going down into the roots...where does it go from there? Can it not hurt your bulbs and root systems of other plants upon decomposition?
This lady wrote a nice article about it (with a terrible kerning and font): http://www.swansonsnursery.com/PDF/1_GENERAL/Horsetails.pdf
The fact that the RHS doesn't even mention lime or drainage when Monsanto does is troubling. There is not a lot of information about Horsetails on that RHS page. The fact that they don't mention removal of the female stems and immediate disposal of them is also strange.