Advice on dealing with bindweed while protecting hedgehogs and garden worms

[OneBusyFinch]

Unfortunately my back garden is riddled with bindweed. After diligently forking up new growth and roots, I’ve had to admit defeat and am going to follow the attached advice as the soil is riddled with it.

I am concerned about the hedgegogs that visit my garden though as this will mean they won’t be able to dig for insects. I have one in a hedgehog house at the moment. Also worried about the worms in the soil.

my front garden is fine thankfully and has a wild corner.

looking for advice really as never had to do this before.

I had tons of it in my previous 100 foot garden. I got rid of it by puling up the bindweed as soon as it showed its head above ground. That eventually starves the roots and it went back next door.

I never use poison, except on bindweed. But I confine it thus - find a strand of bindweed and wind it round some pea sticks, so it can grow up them and away from other plants. When it’s nice and long, unwind it and stuff it into a heavy duty bin bag. Don’t cut it off from the roots. So now you have a living bindweed plant in a bag. Using gloves, mask, etc spray some systemic chemical into the bag and seal. Leave it undisturbed for ages. I take the extra precaution of covering the bag with an old fence panel, weighted down with big stones, to stop any nosy animals getting at it. Eventually the chemical will reach the root of the bindweed and kill the plant.

Sorry OP but that won't work, unfortunately. You need to do as @Gettingbysomehow says and keep on top of it all the time, pulling up every single new shoot as it appears.

Bindweed can be incredibly persistent. I'd probably avoid using chemicals unless absolutely necessary, especially with hedgehogs visiting the garden. Keeping on top of new shoots takes time, but it seems like the safest long-term approach for the wildlife as well.

Yes persistence is key. You just have to get anything and everything it shoots up very quickly. At least its growing season is fairly short. I hear if you can get to it before it flowers it quickens killing it off altogether. So just keep at it and eventually it’ll give up. Might take a few summers before it’s completely gone but I’ve dealt with bad areas like this before.

If it’s also in surrounding gardens you’ll never wholly get rid of it, but you can suppress it - perhaps thick bark / mulch over one area, and persistent pulling it out on others, and alternate? You just have to keep on top of it, it’s hard to eradicate completely.

Thanks everyone - I’m happy to devote time and effort to it. I’ve been doing it for weeks on end and just felt I was fighting a losing battle!

feel better now because I was worried about the hedgehogs