Who do I get to deal with ivy on a tall building?

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Just realised the ivy is reaching the roof on our block of flats. It needs to be dealt with by someone who knows what they're doing, but who? Is this a gardener job? Or tree surgeon? There are 4 storeys. There is no factor or management company. We just split the bill between the flats when stuff like this comes up.

A roofline / guttering company ?

Unless you want the whole thing removing /killing...which may be a gardener job but if it's been there a while might the walls needs scrubbing down and maybe a bit of repointing ? (I'm guessing now)

Do you want to trim it or remove it completely?

Thanks for the replies. I think it might do more harm to remove it completely, but it would be good to stunt it considerably. DH just remembered the property management company for the vacant flat downstairs have said previously that if we had asked them about repairs they could have arranged their usual contractors, so we might start there.

Just remove it. Depending on the type it may be destroying the brick but you would have to check. In any evening it gets into the drain pipes, under the eaves and wrecks things so better without .

A handyman could do it as long as able to work at heights.

I had lots of trees at the back of my house a few years ago and Ivy had overtook the tree branches . The gardener told us to cut off as much as we could growing up the tree and it would then kill the rest above it off when it died you could just pull it down.

Maybe if you work on the same basis cut all the Ivy from the floor till say head Hight the rest should naturally die off the rest of the way up .It will also be easier to remove once it had died.

Just sever the vines. It'll die off.

But not during nesting season.

If there is no management company to interfere I suppose you just need to get a level of agreement with the other owners. Are you in Scotland?

To kill ivy, you work round the building, cutting all the stems at a convenient height (say, two foot above the ground). Dab Glyphosate concentrate on each cut stem immediately with a small paintbrush. It will be drawn down and kill the roots (otherwise, they will just sprout again).

The plant above the cut will eventually die and turn brown and fall off. I find it easier to pull off when dead, but some people like to do it while green.

So you can see you haven't missed any, make another cut a foot or more above the first one and pull off the stems between the cuts so you can see bare brickwork in the gap.

If any of the stems start to sprout in a couple of weeks cut again into the green wood and apply glyphosate concentrate to the cut surface again.

This may happen two or three times but the number of live stems will reduce to nothing.

Glyphosate is inactivated by contact with the soil and there is no point pouring it on the ground. Ivy leaves are waxy and water repellent and do not absorb spray.

Thanks everyone. Yes, in Scotland. I'll get some glyphosate and do what I can reach, and discuss with neighbours and property managers for downstairs about tackling the wider issue. I can't teach enough to tackle the whole y myself.

You can kill it all from ground level

Pulling off may need higher access though it will weather away eventually once dead.