Morning Glories - limiting spread for increased enjoyment

I am posting this here in this free venue forum to offer some perspectives and potential answers to the questions posed in the ID Forum at the end of the thread here
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/885174/
...as a general courtesy...


allieninja - You mentioned:

"Any advice on how to control this thing? We want to actually leave a little bit of it to flower, because I'm a big fan of purple...but we don't want this to continue taking over the entire yard. We pull it up and it just seems to not be phased by us at all, haha."

Keep pulling out the ones that you don't want and do not allow any that you don't want to disperse any seeds...the seedbank in the soil will eventually become exhausted and that will end the cycle of unwanted plants...

Metrosideros - dave...

"Hey Ron, how does one get rid of morning glories?"

By controlling the growth...

Morning Glory is a general term that could potentially refer to thousands of different species with many very different habits...the word 'bindweed' is also a general common name that is mistakenly thought of as having a very specific reference to botanical binomials...e.g.,
Convolvulus floridus
http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/110781/
is a tree that is totally upright and cannot possibly 'bind' to anything but is referred to as Tree Bindweed thus further perpetuating and creating mis-perceptions based upon the indiscriminate usage of common terms
' as if ' they always realistically referred to very specific objective facts ...i.e., the acceptance of certain common terms as if they always referred to objective facts ( as common terms are repeatedly mis-applied) often results in a type of 'stereotypical thinking' that is very frequently inaccurate...
additionally the very large number of different species in Convolvulaceae are very often mis-identified,myths get perpetuated by over-generalizations (!) and and the topic is definitely way too large to address adequately in the ID Forum...

"Convolvulus arvensis is the worst morning glory weed in Hawai'i. It covers any untended fence-line and over-runs gardens. Once it establishes on a person's land they will always have it."

I agree that Convolvulus arvensis is horrendously invasive and unfortunately is often mistakenly thought of as synonymous with the general term 'morning glory'...

I had previously posted some rough guidelines on removing 'bindweed' that I may get around to editing one day...
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/650316/


Ipomoea purpurea is an annual and that makes it a very (!) different plant as compared to Convolvulus arvensis which is a perennial which spreads by seeds and more importantly by underground rhizomes...

"Is there a safe non-polluting way of deterring or controlling them?"

1) select the right species for the right area

Planting Ipomoea purpurea where the seeds will not simply freefall onto a tilled garden area will help prevent the seeds from sprouting where you don't want them to...
deadheading flowers and removing seedpods before they ripen is another approach,but enjoying Morning Glories by selecting the species and variety that works the best for your area is a significant factor in the equation that results in continued enjoyment or somewhat tedious regret...

I will not advocate the use of chemicals that are seriously toxic to the environment...and I perceive the temporary overgrowth of any plant species as much less toxic to the larger ecosystem than chemicals that will spread in many cases around the world and have a long term negative impact on many different forms of life...
plants are much less toxic to the world biosphere than poisons...perspectives will of course vary,but the history of the planet indicates that the temporary overpopulation of most species will eventually balance out in a way that is much less toxic to the larger biosphere than the application of herbicides...

The climate zone and nature of the immediate terrain that the plants are grown in makes a big (!) difference in how the plant will perform as a self re-seeder...

The climate zones having a cold winter are better for limiting the growth of the MG's that are heavy re-seeders because the seeds of many tropical species will not survive the overall winter conditions...

The usage of some kind of seed net / catcher placed under the vine or other methods of channeling the seeds for intentional non-spreading collection can be utilized... e.g., growing the vines over a paved area can make periodical sweeping up of the seeds easier to increase intentional seed herding..


Use a heavy mulch cover (sun blocking plastic if necessary) to prevent any seeds / seedlings from receiving sunlight...most are annuals and do not spread by underground rhizomes...


Ipomoea tricolor will rarely if ever successfully self-resow in the colder zones because the seeds will not survive repeated thaws and re-freezes...

If you already have the annuals sprouting in large numbers... do what you can to pull out the seedlings and / or don't allow them to go to seed...sever the vines from the roots...the annual plants will not re-sprout from the roots...
the annuals will complete their life cycle and there will only be a few seedlings the following Spring if there are no new seeds spread......

There are hand tools available that are designed to easily remove seedlings by cutting the stems...the tools have an edge like a short (but sharp toothed) hedge clipper and when swept along the surface of the ground will relatively easily remove seedlings...particularly useful for getting in between the stems of plants that you don't want to remove without the need to pull each and every seedling individually...the wonders of 'modern' technology...


The following species are not prolific self re-seeders in the cooler zones:

Evolvulus glomeratus
Ipomoea adenioides
Ipomoea alba
Ipomoea albivenia
Ipomoea cairica
Ipomoea carnea
Ipomoea cardiophylla
Ipomoea lindheimeri
Ipomoea lobata
Ipomoea longifolia
Ipomoea macrorhiza
Ipomoea muelleri
Ipomoea pandurata is often self-incompatible
Ipomoea platensis
Ipomoea turbinata
Ipomoea ochracea
Ipomoea setosa
Ipomoea ternifolia var.leptotoma
Ipomoea tricolor - (which is still very often mis-identified/confused with I.purpurea et al)
Ipomoea wrightii
Jacquemontia pringlei
Merremia aegyptia
Merremia dissecta
Operculina brownii
Turbina corymbosa

also the larger flowered Japanese types of Ipomoea nil tends to be less of self-re-seeders than the smaller flowered species like Ipomoea purpurea...the double forms of Ipomoea nil produce few seeds...


"I would love to have Ipomoea purpurea for a weed."

Ipomoea purpurea is not a species that I would be comfortable recommending as a weed in Hawaii...

Ipomoea pes-caprae is the Ipomoea species most often described in positive terms when describing the effect it has on biosystems that may not be the geographical origin of this particular Ipomoea species...

Hope the perspectives offered are helpful...

Ron

P.S. - I usually limit my posts to the Morning Glory Forum...
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/f/floramanana/all/




This message was edited Aug 6, 2008 9:34 AM

Interesting post. There does appear to be a bit of confusion over names in some quarters; for clarification:
Ipomoea = morning glory
Convolvulus and Calystegia = bindweed

In general, Ipomoea come from hotter climates than Convolvulus and Calystegia; where I am (cool temperate oceanic climate; summer mean around 17°C), Ipomoea can't be grown outdoors, whereas Convolvulus and Calystegia are nuisance weeds.

Resin