Will i damage my Japanese Maple if I use Roundup weed killer around my maple to kill the weeds? The tree is about 7 ft. tall.
I wouldn't go near the stuff, and certainly wouldn't have it near plants that I care about. I don't know what it might do to an established 30 yr old 40' tall Norway maple, but a 7' J. maple? Why chance it - maple roots are very shallow.
do you have mulch around the base? we use round-up all the time on our mulched areas under trees to spray bermuda. We are very careful not to get it on the trunk or on exposed roots. Also, don't spray on days where winds are over 10 mph. We have never had any problems. You just have to be very careful. Don't ever use weed killers that contain 2,4-D or dicamba under trees. These chemicals are highly volatile and are absorbed readily by roots.
roundup is absorbed through leaves and other green plant parts, it does not translocate in soil and should be harmless to your maple unless you spray it on the leaves or bark. I am not saying that spraying is a good thing but, sometimes it is the most reasonable solution.
it is quicker and more effective to spray the bermuda or other weeds with round-up or other glyphosate products. we have been doing it for many, many years in our arboretum. If you use caution, it will be fine.
Heres a couple phrases from an email I recieved from the Pest Management. Faculty in Bio-Sciences. From Simon Fraser University, regarding Glyphosate: In the environment, it binds very quickly to soil particles and is thus inactivated. It then breaks down by microbial action, acting as a mild fertilizer by releasing both phosphorus and nitrogen. It consists of the amino acid glycine with a phosphate group attached. This amino acid is found free and as a component of peptides and proteins in humans and other animals, as well as in plants. Phosphate groups are also very common in all living organisms. There is no reason to expect that it would be toxic or carcinogenic. Overall, glyphosate is completely safe. You will even get a mild fertilizing as your weeds die.
I have seen numerous instances of glyphosate damage on garden plants. Nuclear power plants are safe as long as there is never an accident or carelessness, too. Try mixing food coloring or spray dye into the glyphosate so you can see where most of it is going. If you are just going to kill weeds in a small area around the one small tree, maybe by the time you fiddle with mixing up the spray, spraying it and then cleaning the sprayer etc. you could have most of the grass dug out. There have been rare documented intstances of trees appearing to have been killed by glyphosate via the soil. See 'Root Absorbed RoundUp' in Whitcomb, ESTABLISHMENT AND MAINTENANCE OF LANDSCAPE PLANTS (Lacebark Inc., 1991 revised edition).
I agree with Ron. I've just dealt with weeds and grass around a small Japanese maple -- removing the material by hand works well.
[FONT="]Glyphosate is in EPA toxicity class II out of classes I-IV (highest to lowest). http://extoxnet.orst.edu/pips/glyphosa.htm. Interestingly, the herbicide damage in two of the photographs – one of cupped distorted maple leaves, the other of distorted new growth on Japanese maple – at the following website is, in neither case, due to inadvertent application of chemical to the leaves: http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/IPM.asp?code=60&group=32&level=s. We are prone to mistakes, e.g. in using a weedeater, or in measuring or spraying chemicals, even with a shield over the applicator. Look at it as a matter of chance: do you want to take a chance with your maple? [/FONT]
Another variable is "dumping". Pesticides sampled by government agents may be found to contain active ingredients not on the label, suggesting overstock of products is being disposed of by mixing them with others. Inert ingredients have sometimes been found to be anything but.
well, large font aside, I have used glyphosate products (Laredo, Roundup) around japanese maples and many other plants in field production situations, when not sprayed on the leaves or bark it seemed to kill the undesired weeds and NOT the trees. If you have time then by all means pull the weeds by hand. If you choose to use a pesticide, I think roundup type products seem relatively safe and easy to use.
Paul, if you are referring to me and large font, I usually work in a Word document elsewhere, then transfer in, when I have a moment, but simply cannot get the transfer right in this word-processor. If you are referring to capitalized titles, well it works. Frankly, it is comforting that a few of you have quite a bit of experience using glyphosate safely around maples. Who does the government suspect is doing the mixing? The companies themselves? So one may infer that whoever would stoop to "dumping" would be mixing herbicides as well? Mixing of chemicals by persons unfamiliar with their properties is dangerous, to say the least, let alone unethical. I actually advocate for safe storage of chemicals in their containers in storage sheds and garages, as well as safe disposal. Too many people store every chemical used in the house and garden on the same shelf. Two references on the hazards of chemical incompatibility: www2.fpm.wisc.edu/chemsafety/GUIDE2005/Appendix%20f.pdf, dept.kent.edu/ORS/ORSContent/ORSWaste/Lab/TablesOfIncompatibilities.pdf.
In my experience, although I do not use pesticides myself, it is very easy to kill plants which are close to the intended target..for instance one of my gardening clients killed off several hedge cedars while spraying weeds underneath them. I think this was because the cedars have such shallow roots- as does the Japanese maple
Yes, ideally it would be great to pull weeds by hand. In a large landscape setting, our case where we maintain over 1122 trees all with mulched tree wells to the dripline set in bermuda grass, it is more practical to spray with round-up. It isn't possible for us to pull bermuda out of all our tree wells. It has worked great for us. All of our employees are continuously undergoing training to make sure we are spraying pesticides correctly. We have very strict rules on how and when spraying is appropriate. We only use round-up in the "Round-up" backpack sprayer, nothing else goes in there. Sure, drift can happen causing leaf curling and other harmful effects, you just have to use good judgement. So far we haven't had any problems or shown signs of ill effects to our trees due to round-up use underneath them, which doesn't mean we won't ever have problems in the future. This is just the path we have chosen and it has worked well for us.
Thank you all for your responses to my roundup question. I'm deeply moved that all of you would take the time to help. What a great gift you gave me today. thanks so much!
