Best tool to remove climbing vine

Hook up a rope to a car or tractor style lawnmower. Let the VW Golf take the strain. Once the suckery things dry out it more or less falls off quite easily - Ivy does, anyway...

Cutting them up is a recipe for having buts left behind IMHO.

I'd use a chainsaw if it were me, cos I have one. If it were needed, but I'd start by pulling with the lawn tractor.

Pressure washer for that bit...

Unfortunately there's other buildings in the way so there's only about a metre to the side. Enough to get a ladder/scaffolding up, but any large scale pulling would be parallel to the wall - probably won't do very much.

Ratchet straps pulled from the base of the wall are a possibility, but not to much height due to risks of wayward branches damaging other things.

Theo

That might do the trick actually - pulling parallel too the wall.

Or use a snatch block...

Well kill the plants off first and see what it takes to pull them loose

Blow torch and wire brush is exactly what I ended up using!

Tim

Hmm, that's interesting (and the other videos). With the branches being up to 4" across I'm not sure if doing that's going to take the wall with it...

I note that's green - is there any downside to killing it first? I suppose it's more liable to snap and come off in bits, but if it's so tightly intertwined then presumably it'll still want to come off as a sheet?

That does look like a good way to go for cleanup (with a drill wire brush probably).

Theo

Ive had the most success with ivy by killing it first

Me too. Although I had good access. 3" Ivy stems up the garage wall and into the gutter. Biggest nuisance was the mice using it as a route to carry in and store their winter supplies! Reciprocating saw at ground level and pulled off 12 months later. Angle grinder fitted with a wire brush and run at low speed finished the job.