We had really good results with our cut and poison treatments, almost 0% regrowth over the whole 1/2 acre we cleared. Cut with a chainsaw, leaving a pretty tall 1' or 2' stump, drill vertical holes in the stumps with a standard wood drill bit and i believe we were applying a squirt of 5% glyphosate solution (it may have been 20% too, it's been a while and i don't remember anymore). One person on the saw, one person on the drill and a third on the sprayer. I think we were adding a drill hole for every 2-3" diameter on the stumps.
I have been wondering about using girdling cuts and/or intentionally applying infection producing pruning cuts and how honeysuckle would respond to that. On some of the vine growth i snipped this year, i ran the saw along the vine 'stumps' opening up large wound channels, thinking this might allow more pathogens and fungi to enter. Essentially taking the lessons from the shigo book i just read, and doing the opposite on purpose, hoping for the infections to do the work instead of using glyphosate. So far i don't know if this will work, but it seems like it might be cheaper / easier than recruiting extra people and a sprayer full of roundup.
I will go take some pictures of these 'ivy vines' later and maybe somebody can identify them. Some have gotten huge, they keep their leaves all winter, and seem to be completely outcompeting the tree foliage, essentially starving the tree of light. They grab the tree tight with little orange hairs, and it takes a lot of force to pull them off the trunk. They are slowly creeping toward me, probably originally from someones garden, and they put a dark greenish / redish foliage the whole length of the tree, trunk to top. It looks bad to me personally though maybe someone would like it, trees are definitely dying from it.
There are other types of vines that seem less aggressive and i don't really have any good criteria for selecting ones to keep or kill. Generally i'm thinking i want to promote big healthy trees i can climb on so if a vine is going to put extra stress on the tree i'm inclined to pull it off and cut it. On some trees, the entire canopy is knotted with vines and it seems unlikely that would be beneficial to them even if the vine isn't strangling or starving the tree. Using vines for work positioning is occasionally useful and you get to feel like Tarzan
I get the impression that honey suckle compete for nutrients / water, so clearing out honeysuckle (or even a less healthy / desirable tree) near the drip zone and canopy of my favorite trees could be beneficial and more realistic, than clearing the entire forest. Clearing honeysuckle around fallen ash trees might give new saplings the advantage of extra sunlight and a boost for getting up and into the canopy.
Mulch sounds nice but getting machinery anywhere off the beaten path seems like it would be very difficult. Fertilizer stakes sound easier since i can carry everything i need in a backpack. I've seen some references to nurse logs before, but still don't understand the details on that. Does that mean a log or a pile of dead brush underneath a tree counts as slow release fertilizer? When mulching you pretty much go from the root flare out to the drip zone but if i have log or a bunch of brush is there a right or wrong place for it?
We'll see what pics look like.
