Weedkiller / root killer

[ss]

I am recently re laying some 2 x 3 slabs and replacing some badly laid concrete with matching slabs, under the concrete there is a network of roots, mostly fine stuff but a few at a 1cm thickness. What is the best way to deal with this, ideally one of the weedkillers that will kill it off and prevent regrowth for as long as possible. The roots belong to trees/shrubs/ivy which is on the other side of my wall and the roots have over the years forced their way through onto my land so I cant attack by spraying the leaves as the shrubs are not my property.

Any ideas

[harryagain]

Chop them off, dig them out. You need a few inches of scalpings/chippings/coarse sand under your new slabs anyway. You can put some weedproof fabric down the hole before you put in the scalpings. Not that is works so good anyway.

If you kill your neighbour's trees with weedkiller you won't be popular.

[Brian Gaff]

If you kill the plants you could be in trouble with your neighbour. I guess if they are well established you could cut them off at the boundary, but trying to stop them growing back is going to mean killing the plants. Brian

[ss]

It would be classed as common land on the side the tress/shrubs are growing, its not an adjoining property. If there is some `die back` it wouldnt be an issue as the maintenance/management company find it a pain having to come and trim them and are quite happy if we control them although a complete kill off would cause some concern. The main root system will be over the wall so what I have, if killed would maybe stunt them but I doubt if it would kill them.

[Terry Fields]

This was discussed some time ago in the legal group. It would appear that any action that is taken to 'abate the nuisance' is fine, even if the plant concerned winds up dead. I suggest the OP reposts in the moderated legal group for more accurate information.

[The Natural Philosopher]

the best thing to do really is to dig a trench down a few feet at the property or path boundary, cutting all the roots.

The depth will depend on what the roots are from. Some trees go very deep. Others are relatively shallow

And fill it with concrete.

It needn't be wide at all.

killing the roots with anything but something that poisons the soil forever is useless. They will come back.

The concrete wall will imply let the roots inside it die, and prevent more lateral creep

You MAY be able to simply drive some steel shuttering down instead.

But the trick is to cut the roots and put in a barrier/.

[ss]

Thanks for the replies so far but to add to my problem ...I have just built a 40 foot fence along the boundary wall and digging out the post holes (using a manual auger) was tough going in places mainly due to stones the roots didnt cause too much of an issue, its probably fair to say that the roots have been snapped every 6 feet, I got most posts down between 18-22 inches, having built this and in my 60s this plus moving some slabs appears to have weakened my back so I wont be digging a trench hence looking for something to kill the roots my side, most of the patio area is and will remain intact, the strip where the roots are is only 13" wide and about 30 feet long but had badly laid concrete which I have now lifted. As I probably wont be around in 10 years I am not too concerned if they eventually re appear, the current root formations havent caused any issues that I can see. Now I know it cant be bought and it is banned now but would #odium klorate have done the trick.

[The Natural Philosopher]

hire a mini digger.

The smallest will do.

[Huge]

Tosh.

"Sodium chlorate is used as a non-selective herbicide. It is considered phytotoxic to all green plant parts. It can also kill through root absorption."

[The Natural Philosopher]

In the day i used tons of that stuff. it simply washed away and plants came back after a few years.

[Huge]

Ah, so when you said "No weedkiller ...", you were lying? As well as being wrong, that is.

[Huge]

No "perhaps" about it. And what's more, you're *still* wrong.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

A farming trick around here (likely used elsewhere too) is drill a few

1" holes a few inches deep in the stump, fill them with nitrate fertiliser and leave for a couple of months. Sceptical of this, I tried it and found it works rather well. Stump dies right off, rots away nicely.

[Steve Firth]

That's what we did for the Robinia stump, except I filled the holes with glyphosate. I've got cherry suckers in the garden that will get similar treatment this weekend.

[Rick Hughes]

Under my patio, paths & crushed slate areas after levelling I sprinkled a dusting of BORACIL weedkiller. Also sold as Bromacil

Then terram.

Nothing is going to grow through.