preventing aspen suckering/regeneration

[BlakeChorselogger]

Do you know of any options besides herbicide application to prevent aspen regeneration? currently Mixed stand with goal of planting some apple trees. clay soil, northern MN climate - thanks

[Sprucegum]

Cutting them in the spring ,after the sap has risen, reduces the suckering but does not eliminate it entirely. Frequent mowing will eventually get them if that's an option for you.

[crtreedude]

I know this might be a bit hard to accept, but for many trees (don't know about aspen, don't have them here) if you cut them at full moon, they will be less likely to regenerate.  That doesn't say they won't, it just slows them down a lot. This applies for pruning too. The first time I heard this I didn't believe it, until I checked with forestry engineers who set me straight.

We have a chemical that is applied on the stumps to kill them - I suspect you all have it too. I don't know the name.

[thecfarm]

We call them poplars here.You didn't say how many arces you have of these.They are bad for sucking out.Cut one and you get hundreds more.Just like sprucegum said mow them.This works,but does take about 5 years to do them in.Have to be steady on it.Don't say I'll get to it next week.Needs to be mowed every time you start to see new growth.Every 2-3 weeks.I had about an acre of these.Grape wines was growing to the tops of the trees.Had to cut the wines so the trees would fall.I mowed steady all one year.It does start to get better every year.I had a few trees I took my chain saw to and made a bowl in the stump and kept it full of rock salt and put the water to it too and that kills a stump too.Have to keep replacing the salt and keep putting water to it.Seems like there is more to it than that crtreedude.I can remember my Father telling me something like that.But seems like it only happened once a year.

[SwampDonkey]

 :D :D :D Crtreedude, ummm those engineers know something that happened in between the full moons and forgot to mention it.  :D :D :D That's a riot.  8)


Good luck with the apple trees, but I don't think there is an easy way out for the aspen suckering.  :P

[whitepine]

Hi from Northern Minnesota myself and  made pasture out of aspen land. From my experience if you cut the suckers about a year or two after the  tree was cut they will not come back they seem to only be able to sucker from roots once, I asked a local forester about that and he agreed.  By cutting the suckers you deny  nutrients to those roots and they will die. Of course fencing them and letting livestock graze the suckers will  end the problem right away. I am from north of Chisholm so maybe the harsh climate makes them  more fragile here.

[Reddog]

Here in Mi we have had good luck cutting them in june and getting very little regrowth. Then if you walk thru in two years,  in june and cut off the suckers it seems to stop them pretty good. So basicly what Whitepine said.

[SwampDonkey]

It's not going to be easy to mow in a wild stand to keep those suckers back, unless it's real clean and hasn't pit and mound topography on the ground. I do think it can be conquored by cutting, may take 2 or 3 entries. I've noticed when the moose browse them heavily year after year when they are short, they are pretty much done for. I wouldn't recommend turning young cattle loose in there, but they sure would do a number on them and probably have a significant impact on your remaining crop trees to. The idea has been tossed about the forum a couple of times and I think the consencus is don't do it if you value your trees.

[whitepine]

Regarding cattle in trees. I once was part of a trial with the forest service up here on running cattle in young spruce to see the effect. It was not cost effective for fencing but it does  stop fire problems. I have a friend who had a road thru his place and cut aspen on both sides of the road one side had cattle running in it for over 40 years the othe had none and it was a stick shorter on the side with cattle.