We do have willow trees here that will grow very quickly in the right conditions. A picture would really help if you can take one.

And Roundup, though controversial, will take out just about anything.

Do you have a picture of either the saplings or one of the mature trees? Here in my yard we are constantly fighting Black Locust trees. They spread by underground runners and can pop up as far as 50-100 feet from the original stand of trees. If you don't mow them down or dig them out they grow insanely fast. Black locusts have thorns at the ends of their leaves, and the larger trees do produce white flowers that have a honeysuckle-like scent. The ones here haven't started blooming yet.

Black locust is also extremely poisonous to animals and humans when eaten, FYI.

Thanks for mentioning that, tigerdawn. One of the mature black locusts on our property died last year, and about a week ago a heat burst blew it down. The neighbor chopped up the tree and took the logs, but I kept the smaller twigs for composting. Just now as I was googling about the tree's toxicity I ran across some pages that said that Black Locusts have a similar effect as black walnut where they are toxic to plants. Thankfully I haven't mixed it into my compost yet, so I probably need to go toss it in the trash instead. Toxic to animals, people, AND plants? Yikes! Like I need more reasons to hate these stupid trees!

Thanks for the suggestion to take pictures. Here are two, one small "weed tree" and one larger one on the neighbor's side of the fence. Thanks in advance for any help!

Here is a link that might be useful: Weed Tree Album

Oh, those? They must be dawn's favorites. =D

Sancho; I'm just outside of Stillwater. Likely, what you have going is poplar trees. Outside of digging the roots up you can only continue cutting them down and back! They're everywhere here. I had to manipulate my neighbor to allow me to cut hers (which were actually extensions from ours reaching under and up into her yard.) to avoid complete invasion.

bon

Hey Sancho,
Looking at your pictures, I wonder if the plant you are referring too is not some form of Privet (Ligustrum sp.)Hope that helps, Rick

You could try cutting them down and painting the cut part with brush killer, or dril a hole in the stump and pour in brush killer. We had about a million weedy saplings growing between a concrete sidewalk and our house foundation which got this treatment and it's held up for about five years. However, we didn't have runners or ornamental plants around to deal with. Be very careful to get the brush killer only on the bad stuff.

Incidentally folks, I don't believe black locust is nearly as toxic as they make it out. I wonder if perhaps one "expert" said it and the others are parroting him or her. We graze goats, sheep and horses on some land that has a significant amount of black locust trees growing on it. The horses and sheep pretty well ignore it. The goats are slowly eating down the smaller ones, which is what the neighbor, who asked us to graze there, wants.

We had one very large black locust in our front yard. I had to take it down, because its two trunks split and it endangered our power lines. But it had no deleterious effect on the garden nearby. Perhaps, it might, if it were right in the garden itself. Once we cut it down, it sprouted a number of new little trunks from the stump. I am letting one grow back, as we do love this tree. Where I grew up, in NJ, old timers used to plant it around house and barn, as it acts as a natural lightening rod drawing lightning strikes away from the building, and absorbing them itself. Testimony to this were the many "ugly" looking locust trees I observed, as a kid, which had had their tops blasted by lightening. Yet, they continued to grow. Also, the flowers of this tree make WONDERFUL clear, sweet honey when bees forage them. And, posts made from black locust are the best! Old time farmers used to say, "When you set a locust fence post, put a rock on top of it. When the rock rots, it'll be time to replace the post."

George
Tahlequah, OK

George, I've read similar sentiments to your last statement about it being extremely rot resistant, which especially makes me wonder if I have any business putting it in my compost. Won't it just...sit there and never break down? Especially considering it's a cold compost pile. Maybe that won't be such a problem since I'm using small dried twigs instead of the big logs from the trunk.

I don't know anything about plants and goats, but I have firsthand experience that it destroys cat kidneys.

Black locust wood is extremely rot resistant. But the leaves & small trigs break down alright. I don't know what really large quantities might do, as far as affecting that which would be grown in such compost. Dawn, why did your cat eat the stuff? Was it bored? When I was a kid our family cat hunted around black locust all the time. But I doubt he ever tried eating it.

Locust could be like poke. Again, I read alarming things about its toxicity. Yet generations of folk, in various parts of the country, have been raised on it. I've concluded, after all the women folk in my immediate family developed reactions to it, that it affects some people more than others, and conditions & maturity of the plant are important variables.

George

I have eaten Poke from childhood, even eaten fried poke stalk. I was told it taste like fried okra, it taste terrible to me and I did not eat much. I have come to believe it is maybe like some people can be around Poison Ivy, some cant. My youngest son sometimes has to get a shot if he is around Poison Ivy, my oldest son I think could sleep in a bed of it with no ill effect.

When I was a child we did not eat what we wanted, we ate what we could get. Just like the cows pigging out on the first green grass of spring and getting cleaned out, we would do the same thing with poke, but I can do the same thing with any type of greens or beans. I just have to know my limit.