Removing an old Ceanothus
BenDover
Posts: 488
I've got an old Ceanothus. My guess is that its probably as old as the house (circa 21 years?) and put in by the previous owners when they moved in to the new build. It is around 12 feet tall and in a relatively small modern development garden is too big. It is also looking rather tired and although it has leaves on the outside, it is sparse inside. I've noticed that it has flowered less for the last two years and is probably less vigorous on putting fresh growth (which I do hedge trim back) after flowering.
I know that Ceanothus don't respond well to hard pruning so I've made a decision to remove it - however, not sure how easy it will be do to that, especially as the main trunk is probably the size of a medium sized tree. Can anybody tell me what the root system is like for a Ceanothus? I am wondering if I just cut it down low as possible to below ground level, and then replant near it, and let nature take her course on rotting it down, or will I be able to get the stump out, without recking the rest of the garden around it. It is very near the boundary fence, so don't want to cause any issue of pulling half the fence down to get it out the ground.
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May I thank you Verdun for that advice as I have a Spotted laurel to deal with and your advice to Tim has certainly helped me also.
Works wonders for me
swearing and cursing along with kicking the stump certainly helped me remove 2 apple tree stumps last year
Leaving a good length of trunk / stem makes the job a lot easier as once a few roots have been cut it's generally then possible to get additional movement by rocking it back and forth. Best done when there's no audience.
When I was removing a couple of conifers I cut it back, dug round, chopped a few roots etc. As there were a couple of branch stumps a foot or so from the bottom I thought I'd get extra leverage if I stood on them to rock it back and forwards. I don't know if it's true of all conifers, but I quickly discovered that the roots were very shallow and it was very unstable with just a few roots cut. As soon as it started to rock, all the roots decided to give way at the same time. I ended up on my back cuddling 6 feet of conifer trunk.
Thankfully I was in the back garden.
So, finally took the plunge and just taken out the now (was) 15 foot ceanothus from the garden. In the end, discovered that the tap root had grown sideways at 90 degrees to the trunk rather than down and it had disappeared under the fence to next door so despite a massive amount of heaving and hoeing, it wouldn't come out, so, rather than pulling the whole fence down, I've cut it off at the fence line. I assume over time it will just die off and rot away. The best thing is that I've now got a completely empty bit of ground so I can plant something a bit thinner and more vertical in the space.
Now to try and work out how to get all the ceanothus into the green waste wheelie bin!
Last edited: 27 August 2017 12:24:21
Yes the root will rot away over time. We had one removed from our front garden and the remaining roots broke up quite easily over the space of a couple of years.
Is there anyone you can bribe with tea and cake to sit and cut it up? I'm one of those sad people who takes great satisfaction in cutting up stuff to go in the green waste