Combating bindweed: these are the best tips
Combating bindweed is easier said than done. If you are not careful, this climbing plant can take over your entire garden with its white trumpet flowers and arrow-shaped, heart-shaped leaves. Read on to discover what works and what doesn't to combat this annoying 'weed'.
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Bindweed ( Calystegia sepium ) is a perennial plant that grows quickly and produces a lot of leaves and stems with which it smothers other plants, stunts their growth or sometimes even kills small plants. The white trumpet-shaped flowers are also called urinals. This climbing weed comes back every year and combating bindweed is therefore quite difficult.
The roots of bindweed can easily grow more than a meter per year and the stems can grow many meters long. The creamy white roots break easily. And that is a problem, because even the smallest piece of root that remains in the ground will grow into a new plant (yes, you may also know this problem from combating ground elder or combating Japanese knotweed ).
Want to get rid of this rampant climbing plant in your garden? Then get started with these 5 tips against bindweed.
The friendliest method is to remove the light. Cover the ground in the autumn with cardboard and put a thick layer of compost on top of that. The bindweed will no longer get any light and will become exhausted. And the worms will simply work the cardboard and compost through the soil, which will become healthier as a result. Two birds with one stone!
Find the plant early in the spring and grab a shovel right away. Follow the stems to the ground and dig out the roots completely to a depth of 50 cm or even deeper.
Be careful not to break the roots: small pieces will grow into a new plant. If the roots grow through other plants, try to loosen the root ball of your garden plants to carefully remove the bindweed roots. This is also effective in combating ground elder .
Tip
Never throw bindweed roots on your compost heap, because the plant can survive and spread through the garden via the compost. Put the roots in black bags (or use empty potting soil bags), close them well and leave them there for at least a year before throwing them away on the compost heap.
You can also put the roots in the green bin. Municipal compost heaps get hot enough to kill the weeds.
Bindweed grows like crazy on bare ground. So don't leave your ground exposed, but plant it with ground covers to prevent weeds . A carpet of low-growing plants or a mulch layer of wood chips, for example, takes a lot of light away from the bindweed, making it harder for the plant to germinate. And it's also good for your soil life.
Very pretty, those white flowers of the bindweed. If you have let this plant grow and flower, pick the flowers before they have finished blooming. That way you prevent them from forming seeds. If that gets the chance to spread, you will be even further from home next year.
Autumn to early spring is a good time to start combating bindweed. Do it before the plants start growing again. Herbaceous perennials and ornamental grasses that are full of bindweed are best dug up and divided in autumn or early spring. During division, you can remove the bindweed more easily.
If it is not possible to dig up the bindweed roots in the summer, cut the stems regularly to weaken the bindweed.
As far as we know, bindweed has no natural enemies that like to eat the plant. Unfortunately! The leaves are sometimes attacked by snails, caterpillars or fungi, but the roots are so strong that the plant survives this just fine.
Are you unable to control the plant and are you considering combating bindweed with chemicals? In two words: don't do it! We are not in favour of using weed killers in the garden anyway, but it is also of little use. Most agents only affect the leaves, while the plant grows back from the roots. And agents that do penetrate into the roots, such as glyphosate, may no longer be sold to private individuals, because they are possibly carcinogenic to humans and deadly to bees .
But beware: combating bindweed with vinegar , salt or chlorine is also not a good idea for the soil life! It is best to apply the garden-friendly control methods above.
Did you know that bindweed actually has a lot of natural value? It is a host plant for the caterpillars of the bindweed and the flowers provide much-needed nectar to all kinds of bees and bumblebees. If the bindweed does not pose a danger to other plants in your garden, you can decide to give the plant some space by training it against a grid (on which it winds itself upwards). Regularly dig out the roots and new stems to prevent it from spreading.
Field bindweed ( Convulvulus arvensis ) is a cousin of hedge bindweed ( Calystegia sepium ), but its flowers are smaller and usually pink. It also grows somewhat slower, although it can take off on bare ground.
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