Can we kill ivy in our front garden but growing up neighbour's wall

[Fuckedoffat48b]

We are due to complete today on our first property. We bought off a landlord and there are a number of maintance issues that need to be seen to.

One of these is the ivy that is growing from a bed in our front garden, up the neighbour's wall and over onto our roof. We want to get rid of the ivy before it causes any -more- damage to our roof.

Family have suggested as it is growing from our bed we just kill it i.e saw it at the bottom and wait for it to die. Then inform next door about what we have done. I'm aware we will need to pay someone to come and remove it/clear up the wall when it is dead and am willing to pay for that.

Is this really the best way to do this, or should we ask neighbours first? I'm wary of appearing like I am asking permission though.

I’d mention it to them, but not ask permission.

I would inform the neighbour that you are doing it, and say you will repair any damage.

Be warned- it will make their house look awful, so you may need to pay to paint the front of their house, or get it cleaned. I have recently done this!

Yes, mention it to them when you introduce yourselves. They may be delighted!

so you may need to pay to paint the front of their house, or get it cleaned

No way! That isn’t for the Op to pay to get their house painted!

It's your plant. Tough luck neighbours get your own if you like it. Kill the bugger. I hate it. I have tons of it in my back garden and can't control it. Ivy be gone.
They might not realise how bad it can get.

Good luck on killing it! I had ivy on my house when I bought it, growing all up one wall and onto the roof but also onto next door. I tried everything to get rid. By the end it had was not connected to the ground in any way and was cut back/pulled off as far as I could reach but it just kept growing. In the end I paid someone to remove it. It's the best money I've ever spent and the upside is fewer spiders in the house coming in off the ivy! However even now, years later, I still get little bits of it coming throuh the ground. This is despite the roots being treated and pulled out as far as we could get (they disappeared under the fence to next door).

I find if you cut the stems a few inches above the ground, and dab Glyphosate gel on the cut stumps (repeat it if the sap pushes it off) it will soak in and kill the roots. It is easier if you cut and pull off a strip of it at a convenient height so you can see there really are no stems remaining uncut and untreated and running from the ground up the wall.

IME once it is dead it eventually loses its grip and the withered remains will eventually come away, though others say they prefer to pull it off while green.

In my district there is an ivy mite which will infest and kill it. It must be non-flying because it travels quite slowly along an ivy-clad wall. I had one section that seemed immune because it was under an apple tree I used to spray. I stopped spraying the apple tree and the ivy died.

Yes it is for the OP to pay to paint the house. It is law, not opinion.

If a plant causes damage and it is your plant you are liable.

Removing the ivy will leave a kind of shadow where the ivy was.

Consider how long the ivy has been there and how much damage it might have already done to the wall. It is possible the ivy is holding up the wall- although this is unlikely it did actually happen to my neighbour of mine

It took ages to get the ivy off our garage.
Parts were coming off so intertwined , they cane off in chunks like a wicker fence
Had the wall clad and it looks fab now
It did leave its little suckery feet all over

If a plant causes damage and it is your plant you are liable.

Nah, not ‘law’.

The next door neighbours could easily have prevented the damage by pulling the ivy off their house before it took hold.

Sorry, it is the law. Look it up.

The law often doesn't take a common sense approach.

What if the neighbour couldn't afford to remove it, for example?

Look it up.

I tried.

Look on the Garden Law website. Also gov.uk law section.

Or a legal textbook.

No need to be twatty.

Googling threw up quite the opposite on Garden Law anyway.

I wasn't being twatty. You asked where you could look it up for fucks sake!

You are not allowed to attach anything on a neighbouring property - fence, wall, roof anything. If you do attach anything, you are liable. The plant attached itself. But you are still liable. As is the case with Japanese Knotweed.

If a neighbour has been stupid enough to let your ivy grow up their wall then that's their issue and their problem. Same as if a neighbour's tree branches/roots come in to your garden. You can chop them off.

Thanks for this. I will inform them I am going to kill it and pay for removal and warn them it may take a couple of months between the two. I will do this as I am concerned about the damage it could do to my roof.

Just to make it clear, we completed on the house a couple of hours ago. I haven't 'allowed' anything to happen! In fact I was toying with the idea of going up with a saw this afternoon.

@loveka I looked it up. I found quite the opposite.

If you have anything different I’m sure we would all like to read your link.

www.gardenlaw.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=15306

You are not responsible for the ivy growing on the neighbour’s wall; they could have pulled it off their wall. You’re right to want to get rid of it; we had a variegated ivy which looked really nice, but it bent the gas pipe. I chopped it off just above the ground and let it die off. It held on grimly to the rendering so brought some of that off the brickwork, so that had to be fixed. Ivy is a real thug!

That is a forum, people discussing., who may not know what they are talking about. The actual law is on there, different page.

You cannot grow anything up anyones wall without permission. That is the law. If you do, and cause damage you are liable for that damage if the complainant persues it.

The OP says she is paying to have it removed anyway. Which is what she should do. And is what I did when I was in her position, and when I did many days research on it!

The irony was, after paying for the removal and repainting the wall it turned out the ivy was growing from another neighbours garden, not ours at all!

@loveka

different page

don't you want to show us?

Just an aside, sawing it off won't kill it. Pulling it out will still probably not see it off. Ivy is very tenacious.

Well, if you have ivy growing from your house onto another you will look? I don't know how to link. Sorry.

It is absolutely a truth that yiu cannot legally grow plants onto someone elses property.

You are implying I am untruthful. What possible reason would I have ? Peiple are barmy here. Won't bother trying to help in future.

If you are such an expert please post the law that says you are allowed to grow a plant up someone else's property?