Grim things. My son lives in a housing co-op where the prevailing ethos aligns with somewhat hippyish, tree-hugging tendencies...which has meant that every sycamore. elder, ailanthus and robinia have turned the whole place into some gloomy, cave-like doom-laden experience. While the goth types (they are legion) have no problems with this twilight existence, the more daylight orientated members have finally, against stiff opposition, been removing these woody weeds...only for vast swathes of acanthus, alkanet and alexanders to start popping up everywhere. Sooner, rather than later, one of them is going to have to say that monstrous word ' Round-Up.. I confess to vicariously enjoying the tales of communal woe - a plant soap opera with betrayal, deceit and hot passions.

Girdling the trees has been the chosen method at the co-op, with felling and stumpgrinding....but the worst possible news - Japanese knotweed is also making its malign presence felt...so chemical death seems imminent.

I have a gigantic mature TOH/Ailanthus in my yard - 50+ ft tall, trunk 5+ ft diameter at base. A large branch just fell on my house during high winds, so this bastard is coming down ASAP (at a cost of approx $3k, guh). I've read the entire thread above, but it is still unclear to me if a full stump grind without chemicals (removal of entire tap root) will work on these? The guys at the tree removal service I called seem to think so, but after researching online I'm less than convinced. Do I need to apply chemicals immediately after the cut? If so, how long should I wait to grind the stump so that the poison works its way through the root system? Thanks in advance.

Hi Thomas,

While I haven't started my kill project yet everything I have read tells me a stump grind will not do it. A tree guy I had come look at it told me to cut the trunk to a manageable height so as to inspire foliage and then apply herbicide to that. The thought process behind it was to have a means to carry the systemic herbicide down to the roots.

That somewhat conflicts with the USDA suggested method of girdling or frilling and applying herbicide within 5 minutes of making the cut. The timing of application seems critical.

The other thing to consider (I think) is whether the tree is male or female. No literature I have read mentions this and this is strictly my own observation of my trees. That said, it seems that the female tree I have doesn't sucker but instead makes a prolific amount of seeds. The male on the other hand, is far more invasive and throws out new suckers every time I blink. I'm thinking to have a gentler approach if it's a male tree so as to not freak it out into suckering.

This guide from the USDA is what I am using to base my future approach: http://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5410131.pdf

My tree is a good 4 feet in diameter so I know I am in this for the long haul. I have decided on a combination of frilling & trimming it down from 40 feet to manageable. What I haven't decided yet if if I will take one more summer of shade in the process and what exactly constitutes manageable for me.

Good luck.

joAnn This is a good article that explains how and when to cut and apply herbicide so that it will damage the roots. http://plantscience.psu.edu/research/projects/vegetative-management/publications/roadside-vegetative-mangement-factsheets/3ailanthus-on-roadsides

Somehow this forum needs an FAQ including a section on permanent tree removal.

If it's going to sucker grinding the stump won't help, I've seen Robinia send suckers up over 50 feet away from the trunk...and that was after I applied triclopyr to stop stump sprouts. Not sure if tree-of-hell can do that, but it wouldn't surprise me. You would have to stump grind a whole area 60X60 feet LOL.

You can kill the trunk in the aforementioned ways; I haven't killed a huge Ailanthus but I have killed other large trees that were stump sprouters. My personal technique is to drill holes as close to the cambium as possible w/o breaking through. A bit more time consuming but seems to waste less herbicide, none to trickle down the trunk if you use a dropper. Never fails and I usually just use roundup, about 20-25%. Sometimes for maples in a wild area, I just spray the sucker growth with roundup, if you wait until the end of the year and use a strong dilution, it usually finishes the tree off. For the one 5" caliper Ailanthus I did kill, I used imazapyr. It did NOT come back or sucker; I don't know if that was because it wouldn't have suckered anyhow (it was female - had just started fruiting), or if it imazapyr is so much more powerful than glyphosate that it spread out from the trunk and killed all the roots. Pro-grade Imazapyr is EXTREMELY powerful and I don't recommends amateurs use it at all. Which means most of yous lot. I didn't see that it affected nearby vegetation but such a protocol certainly could - I doubt anything will grow w/in 3 ft. of that Ailanthus trunk for a year or two. Which is fine cause it was in a weedy area anyhow. I used it on another particular area that was overrun by pokeweeds and had no desirable plants - at a very light dilution, too. It was an area I didn't mind anything not growing for a year. Well, the very small amount of run-off killed a swath of adjacent lawn grass about 20X20 feet. Yep, just what ran off of the dying pokeweeds! No big deal but a learning experience. I would never have experimented with imazapyr anywhere near desirable plants!

Unless you really, really need the shade I would cut it down now; it gives you a growing season to kill any distant root sprouts with a powerful selective like trimec or triclopyr or both (crossbow), see which is labeled for Ailanthus of course, I'm not sure...if they are in a lawn...or a strong dilution of roundup if they are in beds. Or in a lawn you can just mow over them and probably after a couple years it will finally give up.

You do need to treat the trunk promptly, but 5 minutes is ridiculous.

yeah I quickly ead through this thread again and quickly confirms exactly what I said...

"The suckers are still growing all over my yard, even after 2 Garlon
treatments on all the stumps (right after cutting the trees down)."

ultimately I doubt there is a way that can completely stop suckers on the first round, certainly not with Garlon/triclopyr anyhow. Imazapyr might be better but carries the risk of collateral damage. I wouldn't recommend it for joann.

" Lost of people stereo-typically believe all trees are good, give shade
and are good for wildlife. Some people say "oh but it's our gift from
nature", NO YOU STUPID!!"

Yes I hate these people who let any weed tree grow in their yard. I've dealt with a couple neighbors with this brand of idiocy for years and it drives me crazy.

EDIT: actually this page seems to suggest that if you intersperse the frills, you won't "stress" the tree causing root sprouts.

https://www.nps.gov/plants/alien/fact/aial1.htm

I'm a bit skeptical though. I think anything making the roots "think" the main trunk is dying could trigger a root sprout. With the gigantic Robinia I once had cut down, I immediately drilled into the trunk and applied lightly diluted triclopyr. It did not resprout at all. However there were various root suckers 20-50 feet away! Eventually those all succumbed to either being mown or sprayed with roundup.

I have had one in my garden for 4 or 5 years now. never a sucker or a seed..note I said 1..with no others around to pollinate it and no disturbance of the roots I have not seen an off set. actually like the tree and will leave it be as long as it does not become a problem.

miketropic, It suckers in response to being cut down, so letting one tree grow is one way to limit suckering. The tree also has allelopathic chemicals that can limit desirable plants, so the 'one giant tree' strategy may not be right for all gardens. The fast growing tree also has weak wood and is not long-lived.

I had these shooting up all over my yard when I bought my house. My neighbor told me how he got rid of them so I followed his advice and I am Alanthus free. I purchased a gallon of concentrated glyphosate off the internet, one inch and one and a half inch PVC couplers from the hardware store, and set out to clear my yard. The method is this: cut off a shoot that measures slightly larger than one inch or one and a half inches, tap the coupler onto the shoot with a hammer ensuring a absolute tight fit, pour the glyphosate into the top half of the coupler and wait. The method for smaller shoots involved cotton balls, plastic baggies, and a rubber band...you get the idea, right? Within one season I had it all wiped out.

Thanks beckysimpson1,

I still haven't done anything about my giant tree and want to start within the next couple of months. The guide you posted is very helpful - of course, I hope that when put into practice, it's recommendations work!

On a side note: In the almost six years that I have been here it has acted "male" and never flowered - just sent out suckers all over kingdom come. This year the wily tree flowered!!! Littered my rain barrels and gave me lovely foul smelling water because I didn't catch it in time to keep the tiny flowers out. =sigh=

I'm sure it knows I am planning it's demise.

the males and females both flower, although the flowers could look different

Ah! I didn't realize that - until this year. My assumption (no research obviously) was that the female tree self pollinated.

Does anyone know if the Bayer Advanced Brush Killer Plus would be effective when painted on the stump. It has a Triclopyr, triethylamine salt concentration of 8.8% and I'm not sure if that is enough.

It would probably be strong enough if you added a bit of detergent, but personally if I had my hands tied behind my back and had to buy a rip-off consumer-grade product at a big box store, I'd go with the strongest dilution of generic roundup I could find. It's probably cheaper on a per unit basis than "Bayer Advanced Brush Killer Plus" and will be just as effective killing the stump.

Of course the best approach, really, is to buy a pro grade product specifically labeled for that activity.

While I agree with the basic thrust of davidrt's comments directly above, triclopyr is one of the two primary herbicides for cut/treat applications, ie, painting or daubing a bit of concentrated herbicide on cut stumps or stems of unwanted woody plants, with glyphosate being the other. The thing is, in some species, the one will work better, in others, the other item. Only research and trial and error will distinguish which is the better material for Ailanthus. I do a ton, or perhaps a ton and a half of such work (or should I say, have other people do) but as Ailanthus is not a primary target in the wild places where this work gets done, I really don't know which would be the more effective. Ultimately, with cut/treat, it is the labor and time which adds up, with any herbicide usage being fairly limited, since you're just painting a wee bit onto the cut stem. So I'd use whatever my research indicates would be the most effective. Coming back and re-doing is what you want to avoid.

After I bought the 8.8% I began to read that most people recommended a concentration of at least 20%. The higher concentrations are very expensive and I can't find a source for smaller amounts that about one gallon. I will be doing the work myself and perhaps I will be able to determine if this concentration is effective and save other money by one order of magnitude. Thank you very much wisconsitom

While I agree with the basic thrust of tom's comments (!)...my point was generally, the "consumer grade" glyphosates are a little more concentrated than the "consumer grade" triclopyrs. I think there are still glyphosates you can buy at Lowes, HD et all that are over 20%, OTOH, I've always seen various selectives are at 10% or less. They also charge more for selectives.

The most detailed account I've read, actually, of a state-sanctioned herbicide use to control Ailanthus used imazapyr(!). I myself used it once for a just-starting-to-fruit female Ailanthus I found. But there's every reason to think sufficiently concentrated glyphosate will be fine. One thing I've done to be absolutely sure it works, if you aren't doing many, is to drill a few holes right along and inside of the cambium layer with a big 1/4" drill bit. Use a dropper bottle to fill those with the herbicide mix. That _really_ insures enough absorbs into the meristem tissue to kill it.

(2eatcrow or other "noobs" DO NOT try to buy a product with imazapyr, it can have lots of "unintended consequences".)

This is Triclopyr, triethylamine salt. In everything I have read on the topic Triclopyr is recommended over other herbicides, including glyphosates at equivalent concentrations. I like the idea of using drilled holes to administer the herbicide.

Yep it's really hard to believe it will survive even 8% triclopyr if you fill such holes with it. Good luck. How many do you have to remove? Remember to add a tiny bit of plain dish detergent. (i.e., not the 'bleaching action' kind, which could well damage the herbicide) Although consumer formulations claim to already have surfactant, I always think they skip a bit. One could argue it won't really matter in the holes, but I mean, detergency is detergency. It can't hurt AFAIK.

Clarification taken, davidrt. One thing struck me while re-reading the posts here.....one advantage of those Garlon-excuse me-triclopyr formulations intended to be mixed in either fuel oil or MSO-methylated seed oil-is that now the work can commence even when ambient air temps are at or below the freezing point of water. This may not make one bit of difference to the matter at hand, but is one of the reasons such products gain favor with the pros.

As for imazapyr, my contractor guys use that for certain tough weeds out in the field, but I forget which just now. For that matter, those guys use Transline and Milestone for some even tougher foes. You-MR. or Mrs. Homeowner-do not want to get into that business! Both of these items are of the type where even grass clippings from lawns where these chemicals were applied can go on to kill garden plants even after a full round of composting. Extremely persistent-this factoid does not come into play in the way we use them.

I think a lot of folks would be shocked at the variety and amount of herbicides used in "native restoration". It's not all honeybees and butterflies, although if one adopts a sufficiently long-term view, those organisms are very much aided by this type of work.

I've used Triclopyr and found it to be effective, isn't that the one that you dilute with diesel fuel?

Here is a gallon container of 41% Glyphosate. Homeowners can buy it off the shelf of their local farm store for about $30. The reason I like glyphosate concentrate is it can be applied with a brush directly to the basal wound of TOH, bittersweet vine, autumn olive, etc. Since I am usually working with others I add a pigment such as food dye so we know which stems are treated.

It doubles as a foliar spray, dilute with water and a squirt of dish detergent. I use a Solo backpack sprayer. Foliar spray will kill Japanese Knotweed, Running Bamboo and English Ivy but may require additional application. I never spray if temp is less than 60°F. Leftover herbicide and sprayer should be stored above freezing.

Actually, both Garlon itself and the numerous generic versions, such items as Tahoe, et al, are now offered in up to 5 different formulations! I like the one where MSO is to be the carrier, although we've got and use the water-based type as well. All versions are triclopyr, the varying part being what carrier they are intended to be diluted into.

3A (triclopyr ester) can be dissolved into water or diesel, the 4 (amine) can only be dissolved in water of course. If you "dissolve" an ester into water you a really making an emulsion and must add sufficiently surfactant. You need to add surfactant to most pro formulations anyhow....Although I suppose if there's a triclopyr ester already dissolved in a methylated seed oil, you wouldn't need to. I would wonder about the shelf life of a formulation like that. These days the amine is getting harder to find in < 2.5 gallon quantities on the pro market, because it seems most commercial users just use the more powerful ester. But I find the amine useful to have around...I found this place has it in 1 gallon: Alligare Triclopyr 3 - AquaTerra Group, LLC / US Lake and Pond Supplies

Be VERY careful not to accidentally buy a mix of triclopyr and chlopyralid! This can also have "unintended consequences" tom and I alluded to.

Anyhow as sam points out glyphosate is cheaper, more wildly available, and just as useful if not more so for this kind of work. Trust me, the right concentration will certainly kill Ailanthus.

"I think a lot of folks would be shocked at the variety and amount of
herbicides used in "native restoration". It's not all honeybees and
butterflies, although if one adopts a sufficiently long-term view, those
organisms are very much aided by this type of work."

LOL, so true. But thank goodness these things are available, I can't imagine maintaining a property like this (3 acres, 3 borders on wild areas) without them.

I need to remove hundreds of them,
along with some multi-flora rose. The good news is that most of them are small
and I can use lopping shears to cut the stem. The bad news is that I'll have to
convince my neighbors to allow me to eliminate their's as well or else they
will just come back onto my property faster. It reads like you guys
like Glyphosate better than Triclopyr.

I have found:

32 oz of 41% Glyphosate for
$23.92 ($0.75/oz)

http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/gly-phosel-pro-41-with-surfactant-p-1844.html

and

64 oz of Triclopyr - 61.6% for $51.95 ($0.81/0z)

http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/hiyield-range-and-pasture-triclopyr-p-15999.html

Do you guys/gals think either of
these would work for Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima)

This discussion has been very helpful to
me.

I personally think either would work, but I would defer to someone with actual experience dealing with that many, of Ailanthus specifically, to be sure. I've dealt with one, and since I personally removed and burnt every seed head from the crown, hopefully that will be all I will be dealing with for a while. (I mentioned before, the seed heads burned amazingly fast for week-dry plant material. What happened in my case is I removed two huge dense maples. Little did I know lurking behind them was a 20'+ Tree of Hell that had probably never bloomed. Of course now with light, it bloomed on the sunny side. I didn't spot it until fall because it was still partly obscured by other trees and grape vines. I was outraged there was a fruiting Ailanthus on my property and went into "emergency mode" LOL. I cut it down and removed every single seed head. I then worried about suckers and figured, hell, I might as well pull out the big guns for the 5" trunk. I drilled 4 holes and added undilute 20% imazapyr. Needless to say, no suckers ;-). I covered in this case with because you don't want something like imazapyr washing away. Fortunately I have seen no seedlings back there but I plan to check every year. Some idiot in the neighborhood has one in their yard, however it is male. No other trees back there died, but of course no one in their right mind would do this in a bed of ornamentals with imazapyr. If it does run off it can have astonishing killing power.)

You should have said you had that many, we would have told you messing around with non-pro stuff would be a waste of your time AND money!

With the prices so close per ounce, my gut instinct is to tell you to go with the triclopyr. If nothing else, it kills a little faster than glyphosate, so it will be more obvious to you that your efforts were successful. In this case, dealing with a monstrously weedy species, definitely follow the label directions for dilution in diesel.

But again, be aware NOT to do this within, say, 20 ft. of any ornamental plants. In humid weather, especially, ester vapors can travel through the air and zap sensitive plants. But I don't think that's what you are dealing with.

Actually...

Now that I think about this, I wish I could find the write-up from a professional forester on doing this, where he recommended imazapyr. It could be that the reason they use it for Ailanthus, is while triclopyr kills very quickly, the kill is somewhat localized. Maybe the distant roots can still sucker. Whereas imazapyr is a very slow killer. I've seen it take over 3 weeks to kill a big patch of poison ivy. But once it kills, it is really dead. And depending on how much you use, a whole area of soil can be dead for up to a year, too.

So the issue is though, imazapyr can spread in the roots, and still be so powerful that after the roots die, it moves to adjacent plants and kills them, too! Are you dealing with a forest that has desirable trees in -addition- to the Ailanthus? Or is it just a big mega-patch of Ailanthus? I don't want you to go through all of the work, and then have a million suckers to deal with. There must be a study of this somewhere. But I'm pretty sure the website I saw was talking about restoration of native forests, so probably if you use just the right amount of imazapyr and keep it localized, you do not kill adjacent trees. As I said in my case, I covered the holes. A large maple about 20 ft. "downstream" is still alive.

Let me do a bit of googling, since no one so far has mentioned dealing with this exact situation.

This seems like a good page with a summary of methods and findings.

http://techlinenews.com/articles/2014/tree-of-heaven-a-devil-in-disguise

Apparently triclopyr or imazapyr are better than glyphosate. If you aren't concerned about adjacent/nearby species, I'd definitely go with imazapyr. However be really carefully it can't run off onto, I dunno, your neighbor's corn field. We don't want to get you in trouble!

Unfortunately I still can't find the detailed field report I saw a year or so ago that advised imazapyr over any other.

Thank you David,

It is a roadside and rapidly encroaching on a nice native hardwood forest forest. I must be extremely careful. I really want to apply in a very controlled way (disposable foam paint brush) and to avoid residual efficacy. These exotics are a real problem.

This paper advises that "hack and squirt" doesn't cause suckers to form, or not as many. While what I did does cause them...! In my case, I had to cut the tree down to get the seed heads. In your case, if you start right now, the seeds are probably not ready. Hack and squirt is obviously easier than cutting every one down. So I would just use the triclopyr dissolved in diesel or MSO. Plenty of killing power, and no worry about it running into your desirable hardwoods. Definitely wear eye protection!

SessionC_Apsley_BiologyandControlofAilanthus.pdf

I'll jump in here, as one who has had extensive recent experience and excellent success with destroying T of H. It took some trial and error, but I finally found a system that worked.

A couple of acres, guesstimate 6,000+ plants ranging from ankle-high seedlings/runners, through to 6 metre tall trees (6" diameter trunks). A jungle.

Started with everything taller than waist-high, using a bow saw and 41% glyphosate brushed onto the freshly cut cambiums. 99% kill, and followed up 12 months later for 99.99% success. (Oh, my aching back!)

The smaller plants received a foliar spray of THIS mixed with a quantity of glyphosate (as per recommended by manufacturer) and a surfactant. Again, it needed a follow-up spraying a month later for a few that survived (or that I'd missed), but very happy with the results.

I did another walk-over 12 months later, as some of the "dead" trunks sent out new shoots, and a few new young ones appeared, but zapping them was a stroll in the park.

I'll always keep an eye on the area, as I never trust this plant, but an annual touch-up is bearable compared with what I started with.

It's been like 2-3 weeks since I'm clearing up these nasty T of H. I have used Bonide Vine And Stump Killer which has 6.36% Triclopyr in it. I bought it because it was cheaper than any other herbicide on Amazon. I have not used it near a pond because It can "contaminate" groundwater. Now so far I think it has worked. I cut many small 1-4 inch caliper trees with a bow saw and immediately painted them. Ones that were cut lowest to the ground have so far had no resprouts, but ones like 6" from the ground have re-sprouted. Some have unusually flowed some sap like substance up to the stump, is this normal? also find it prudent to pull out smaller 1-2" caliper trees by hand. On bigger trees like 5-15" caliper I girdled them with a bow saw and found out that the bark of these trees is so thin like 1mm compared to 1-3cm of Siberian Elms. The outer living cambium layer ranged from 3mm to 9mm and was easy to rip of once I cut into the trunk 2 parallel lines 1 inch apart and then peeled them with a chisel. I proceeded to paint the bottom ring of the tree so the herbicide reached the roots. Immediately 3 days after this, the tree is beginning to show signs of distress compared to trees that I ONLY girdled without herbicide. The leaves are dropping, yellowing, and immature fruits are falling. (I have done this same thing with same results with Norway Maples, Sycamore Maples, and Siberian Elms)

Now as for using a herbicide near water, I have found that Glyphosphate seems to be the way to go, but I DON'T want to buy Roundup Rodeo which costs like $120 US per gallon. I have found this 18% Gylphosphate formulation Roundup Weed and Grass Killer Concentrate Plus (Amazon.com) but I am unsure if I have to dilute it and if it's safe around water.

Rodeo isn't that expensive, and the reason it's the wetlands approved version is that it doesn't have a common surfactant added to many glyphosate formulas that can cause issues with aquatic animals. The glyphosate itself isn't the issue, or the lack of an issue! Likewise, there are forms of triclopyr for aquatic use, like the one I linked above.

Not saying whether the consumer version worked for you, or didn't work...but one thing for everyone to be aware of is triclopyr can cause, visually, the appearance of extreme damage without fully killing the plant. Personally for something like Ailanthus I would stick with the commercial ester formulations in a non-polar carrier...but that isn't to say the Bonide product won't work.

Oriental Bittersweet Vine

Glyphosate is tinted with a dye. This is applied generously to the cut end. With any luck, this will be drawn down and kill the root system. This invasive removal takes place on a local park. The whole 80 acres is "trashed" with bittersweet, honeysuckle, multiflora rose, privet, autumn olive, mile-a-minute among others. It is a daunting task but we are slowly making headway. Foliar spray is out of the question since foliage is high overhead.

I live in Andalucia Spain. I have an Ailanthus infestation on my land (about 2 acres) from roadside planting. Been trying to eradicate them for years. My advice/experience is as follows. I don't like using herbicides but spot application of glyphosates work on smaller plants. Pull up seedlings - don't let them get woody. Cut down all female trees as a priority and treat stumps - they produce masses of seeds. Male trees do not seem to throw out shoots unless cut. Regular scarifying helps as well because they do not seem to like their roots being disturbed. The plant stores food in root nodules as well which makes them able to grow quickly, so it is important to keep on top of the scarifying. On the positive side, stems and foliage chopped up make an effective mulch round my fruit trees because Ailanthus (like roses) seems to produce a natural herbicide. I have removed them completely from part of the land but there are lots in an gully that is inaccessible and there are female trees in there. Terrible things - I have read about an alfalfa fungus that kills them but I would be worried that I would be introducing something that would affect alfalfa growers - there is quite a bit of alfalfa grown around us.

Is there any way to get rid of this tree of (hell) without using toxic herbicides?

Do any animals even eat them? I know deer won't. Some bugs were eating the leaves last year, but the tree just laughed them off. I cut down the tree and kept burning papers and cardboard near it, it's still alive. This is right near my garden and I won't use any herbicides on it.

Is there any Ph range it can't tolerate? What about pouring a gallon of bleach undiluted on it? I know bleach is toxic, yeah but I'd rather use that than glyphosate.

What about pasturing animals on it (heavy ones like cows) in an enclosed space for the fall/winter, or would that be even worse.....I know they trample everything down, but would it spread even more.

God, those things are awful! I keep pulling out suckers, now hopefully will mow it soon too.
Does any animal eat it? I can't imagine any living creature eating that nasty tree.

Has anyone tried using a 20 lb bag of rock salt? I'd rather have a 'dead spot' than this tree from hell.

Ailanthus, Stinky Devil Tree. I'm happy to have found this site and to know IT'S NOT JUST ME. Yes these are monstrously difficult to eradicate. I haven't read all the posts so I'll add some of what I know and mention my current efforts. Digging them up; yes it's easier when soil is wet and soft, but beware; you have to get every fragment of root out. My experience is that airborne seeds will fall into cracks and start rooting horizontally a few inches down, and then go vertical, and that cut trees, large and small, will send out runners that are hard to locate and remove. I like a post way back up there that suggests using PVC couplings to make a receptacle that can be attached to a cut tree and then filled with strong Roundup. AND YES I LOATH ROUNDUP and only use it for these trees. 2 more things. I am trying a variant. I have some very sticky mouse trap papers about 4" x 8" with peel off plastic. On a cut tree I've wrapped 1/2 of 1 in a funnel shape and clamped it to the tree with hose clamps, and filled it with RU. Waiting to see. I read about a non-toxic herbicide: I gal. white vinegar, 2 cups Epsom Salts, 1/4 cup original blue Dawn detergent (and I added 1 teaspoon of TSP super detergent. It appears to work on Bermuda grass, with repeated applications. So I'm going to try that mix with the funnel method on Ailanthus trees. Thanks. More later.

When dealing with tree of heaven saplings, I spray and 2 way mix of glyphosate and triclopyr. Works better than glyphosate alone.

I posted a couple days ago. I'd like to add that pouring boiling water on the younger sprouts, less than a foot tall, may also work. I saw this on a different site a month or so ago and tried it, 2 applications over 3-4 days and the sprouts appear to be dying. Make sure the boiling water gets down to the roots. I'm dealing with clay soil with cracks so that helps penetrate down.

I have never tried to kill Tree of Heaven with glyphosate, but I suspect what you are observing is merely the fact that triclopyr is a lot faster than glyphosate. The correct dose of glyphosate should kill just as well, it could just take as long as month under some circumstances. But if you want fast - or the thing is about to seed and you need fast - by all means just use triclopyr ester mixed with diesel or vegetable oil.

The one I did find adjoining my property was so concerning, I decided to go with the ultimate plant killer, imazapyr. After cutting it down and burning the seed pods (it had just started to seed, so lucky I caught it that year) I drilled four holes in the trunk and poured in 20% imazapyr. Needless to say it stayed dead AND no suckers at all.

Imazapyr kills so slowly, but so thoroughly, mixing with a growth regulator type herbicide like 2,4-D or triclopyr is specifically contra-indicated. The growth regulator could kill most of the plant before imazapyr has time to kill all of it. Of course, you have to be INCREDIBLY careful using imazapyr in a garden setting, because once in the soil, it can kill adjacent plants. What I've seen is if the mass of plant material you're deal with meets a certain threshold, and you know the imazapyr was truly targeted into that plant tissue and don't go overboard, this doesn't happen. But definitely DO NOT experiment near anything dear to your heart. I sprayed some along a garage because I didn't want anything growing there at all, the runoff pattern killed grass for an area of about 16ft X8 ft. - roughly the same square footage of what I'd sprayed, if not slighty more! This lasted for about 2/3 of a growing season, then in the fall weeds started taking over the killed off section of grass. What I should have done would have been to spray a very narrow bead of the imazapyr right along the wall of the garage. (in other words, I saw no auxiliary killing around the ailanthus, because the few mLs I put in the drilled holes were only slowly released from the dying roots, apparently. OTOH, a strip of broadleaved weeds along a wall...well, just spraying with imazapyr, it wasn't all absorbed into that plant tissue - not enough and not as deeply penetrating an application technique and you had some runoff. One of the conservation groups in the Appalachians, IIRC, uses imazapyr to control Ailanthus in forest settings, and obviously believe that applied judiciously, it's not going to kill the whole damn forest LOL.)

LOL, just realize I'd already told the story of my brush with the Tree of Hell, in this thread!

So I’m hoping to resurrect this thread. I have at least one of these trees in my backyard. Ive read up on how best to kill it (I will be going with the ha k and squirt method with tricolpyr). assuming everything works, when should you cut down the now dead tree? I don’t want it to fall on its own as it would take out my neighbors fence. Is this something that is done within weeks? Or if I treat the tree with poison in fall, should I cut down the tree in spring?

Like the Tree of Heaven this thread just keeps coming back...

OK, I couldn't help myself!

Well, I FINALLY had my giant tree taken down last June. (2017) What the arborist did is cut it down in full foliage, then bored holes into the trunk & roots filling them (much to my dismay) with Roundup. Over a year now and the main tree is dead. In fact, it has given new life to a couple of different shelf mushrooms. He didn't use a stump grinder so as to leave access to the tree should it not die as intended. That and the ginormous roots that were taking out my basement would likely lead to an entire different can of worms so best leave the ground untouched until I decide to fix the basement. That said, there are still a couple of offshoots coming up that I have been remiss in treating. I need to stop that and treat them.

I am satisfied with the results. Now I just need to mop up it's mess. Good luck with yours.

I have an Ailanthus in my yard. I researched ways to get rid of it and although I’m opposed to herbicides, I made an exception for this tree. I read all info I could online and finally reached out to an invasive species specialist at Penn State. He advised NOT to cut this tree before using the hack and squirt method. I used Garlon 3 A for the squirt although the specialist said I could use the strongest formula of roundup (ugh). My tree is in distress and is dying a month later. He advised that basal stem treatment or stump treatment is not as effective as hack and squirt, if at all. My neighbor chose to simply cut her Ailanthus and she now has sprouts continuing to grow all over her property and possibly on mine. The roots have to be killed along with the tree in order to stop this horrendous plant!!!

Wondered as someone asked above, so once it dies, if one has only hacked and applied chemical, when do you cut it down? the parent trees in my residential neighborhood are 30’ tall. if they are killed to root, how long dies that take and when to cut down.

I hacked and squirted with garlon 3a (trylopyr) august of last year and this year the tree is half dead. I’ll be applying another treatment this august. best months are july thru sept when the sap is flowing down - VERY important. My tree is also big. I’ve read that it can take 2 years of treatment to fully kill the tree. When it’s dead, you’ll know. The branches don’t leaf and branches begin to break and fall. I’m still seeing shoots which I eliminate promptly. This tree is a nightmare. Had i known, I would never have bought this house😄. I will have the tree cut when I see no more life on it. Hope this helps..

If you have a large, invasive tree...the lowest effort way to kill it is to pry the bark off in a complete circle around the base of the trunk to girdle it ASAP.

Here's how to do it on Glossy Privet, but the basic technique can be applied on any tree. And a shovel will work too to pry the bark off. The reason why it works is that it prevents the photosynthesized sugars from going down to feed the roots...which then slowly starves the tree. This works on various types of trees. I've tried it myself successfully on Glossy Privet and Chinaberry already. Typically, the existing branches will stop leafing out and it will resprout from below the girdle over the next half year. Obviously, break any of those resprouts off, and keep starving the roots. And then watch the tree continue to die off after that.

The great thing about this method is that it requires no toxic herbicides and little manual labor, too.

Now once the tree dies for good, you can just let it rot in place for a while before cutting it down in parts at your convenience to prevent falling hazards.

Of course, if the tree is a sapling or smaller and can simply be uprooted, then that's even easier and faster.

And if it's multi-trunked and srhrubby, then girdling gets a lot harder.

But for large, single-trunked trees...IMO, this method is the best option.

I killed one a couple of years ago- in the fall I cut it down and immediately painted triclopyr straight concentrate on the cut stump. Immediately- like when the tree fell- I painted the stump, no waiting- I had the stuff ready to go.

I've been watching closely for root shoots but two years now and nothing.

This was a tree in my backyard neighbor's yard- close enough that it worried me. But I got their permission to 'clear the weeds' in their back corner and then I took the liberty of clearing the 'big one' as well while I was there. Fortunately they hardly ever even walk back in there and if they noticed they didn't care. Phew!

I finally killed my Ailanthus with garlon 3A hack and squirt method. As written in my previous posts above, it took 2 applications a year apart to do it. I can happily say there are NO shoots anywhere on my property now and the tree is absolutely dead. I noticed my neighbors who had their Ailanthus tree cut down still have shoots growing all over their property years later from the live roots still in the ground. I don't advise a top kill (and neither does Penn State) on this tree. Get the roots.

Cut down and spray the stump with roundup....that's how we did it when I worked for a ecological restoration company. If you ring the tree they just push up more stems out if e ground.