Removing Spanish Bluebells

Buttercup

Please can anyone advise me how to remove spanish bluebells, each year I dig them up but they return again double the amount!

I_have_spoken

Glyphosate?

Primrose

Weedkiller will longterm toxify yiur soil. Wait until they have finished flowering, or even just before although you might as well enjoy their colour and then dig your gardening fork under them as deeply as you can to try and pull the bulbs out whole. If you slice a bulb in two, try and get it out or it will regenerate next year. Destroy the bulbs and obviously don't put them in a compost heap where they will simply regenerate again if compost is spread around.

It may take a couple of years to get rid of all the bulbs. You just have to be persistent and keep at it!

Another spreader like this is cuckoo pint which has wide green leaves with pretty cream veins in them and red berries. It is actually rather attractive but again if its bulbs get split it will regenerate everywhere. As a notice gardener I once split up clumps of it and planted them around the garden . Worst mistake I ever made. Darned stuff now keeps appearing everywhere and I'm continually having to dig it out !

A._Badger

Primrose wrote: »

Weedkiller will longterm toxify yiur soil.

Could you provide some scientific evidence for that sweeping statement, please?

If you are right (and I do not think you are) then most of the arable land in the western world is now 'toxic'.

Patchwork_Girl

I have these in my garden and have been removing them by hand - digging up the bulbs with a trowel and picking the bulbs out of the soil. A few escape but there are only a couple coming up in the areas I cleared 'fully' last year.

I understand that weedkiller does not work on bluebells. "Bluebells are strongly resistant to weedkillers and it appears that no garden weedkiller will kill them or even check their growth." https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=426

arbrighton

I dug them all out of parents garden a few years ago. Trowel, grab out all bulbs and split bits. Little to no regrowth if you are thorough

Eenymeeny

I find that giving them a good watering the night before I intend removing them helps. If you're lucky they'll slide out, and it reduces damage to surrounding plants

JP08

Primrose wrote: »

Another spreader like this is cuckoo pint which has wide green leaves with pretty cream veins in them and red berries. It is actually rather attractive but again if its bulbs get split it will regenerate everywhere. As a notice gardener I once split up clumps of it and planted them around the garden . Worst mistake I ever made. Darned stuff now keeps appearing everywhere and I'm continually having to dig it out !

Arrrggghhh - the !!!!!! cuckoo pint. Any idea how to get that out of an established bed - with the added complication that it has grown from the existing sunken garden so the roots are best part of 18" below the surface? So no digging the damn stuff out.

At present we're working on the basis of regular patrols with the dab on spot weekkiller ...

Primrose

I share your frustration. I think the only remedy for roots that can,t be dug out is to snip off the leaves as soon as they show the light of day. It may eventually weaken the bulbs. I try to garden organically so weedkillers are an option I want to avoid.

Oxalyis (a small three leaved weed rather like a shamrock is another nightmare in this garden. Any tiny bulbils left behind seem to regenerate at twice the rate !

JP08

Primrose wrote: »

Oxalyis (a small three leaved weed rather like a shamrock is another nightmare in this garden. Any tiny bulbils left behind seem to regenerate at twice the rate !

Yep - got that too - and something that looks and root spreads a bit like its bit bigger brother, sort of leaves three times then size.

jusnoneed

I have been doing battle with the dreaded Grape Hyacinths for the last few years. Dug out hundreds of the flippin things! Sprayed with weedkiller etc. No effect.
In our local paper last week the gardening chap said the touch on gel weed killer probably best way, but whichever you do it's best to crush the leaves first, as they are smooth and waxy the liquid sprays just run off and doesn't get taken into the plant. Never thought about that before so will be giving it a try.
If you ever want to get your own back on someone give them a pot of GH bulbs!!