Maple saplings

[Ridge235]

I'm looking to cut a bunch of maple and ironwood saplings to help the oak situation and get more sunlight to the ground. I do have tordon, is this what I should use on the stumps? Any particular time of yr I need to do this? Hopefully now. Thanks

[WDH]

Tordon is soil active, so confine it to the cambium layer on the cut stumps.  Don't slosh it all over the place or it can kill surrounding plants.

[Ridge235]

Thanks WDH..one more question..if I choose to girdle some trees, then I lightly squirt the tordon into my cut, is this right?

[WDH]

I use a squirt bottle like formula 409 cleaner comes in.  Easy to squirt the chemical into the cut.  Google the tordon label to see the mix.

[Klunker]

I cleared a path way thru about 1000ft of woods. I cut everything in the path and on the sides of it.
Lots of sugar maple and iron wood. I have never seen these 2 species resprout in the woods.
Aspen and red maple, yes.
Just my experience.

[Clark]

Have you thought of burning? Maple doesn't much care for fire while oak will do quite well with it. Ironwood, now that is a tricky one when it comes to fire tolerance.

Clark

[maple man]

I don't know anything about Tordon but if you have any maples nearby that you don't want to kill then I would be very careful about using any poison. I am using Glyphosate for beech suppression and find the if I treat a good sized stump then I see browning and even mortality in trees up to 50 feet away.

I am also doing a lot of mechanical weeding and thinning in sapling stands cutting red maple, ash, popple, hop hornbeam and badly formed oaks and find that if I cut them somewhat high then I get very little regrowth and they are shaded out within a few years.

[WDH]

If you cut them high, it is easy to spray the cambium and keep the herbicide confined to the cut surface.  They rot pretty quickly and are easy to push-kick-knock over in about a year or less. 

[Ridge235]

Okay great info, gonna be a lot of work but it needs to be done. Amazing how a woods full of oak and hickory but you can hardly find an oak sapling anywhere. Definitely more young hickory than oak but the vast majority of saplings are sugar maple and small iron wood trees. Thanks