Eventually it could. It can climb up into the canopy, smothering or shading out the tree foliage. It can also make the tree topheavy and unstable in high winds. And as ivy grows upward, it tends to change from its more common juvenile form into the adult form with heart-shaped, unlobed leaves and producing flowers and fruit. This fruit can then be spread by birds and other wildlife, increasing the vine's presence in natural areas. This can be a major concern in areas where the ivy is considered invasive.

Take a minute and look over [THIS[(https://www.houzz.com/discussions/ivy-and-other-vines-on-trees-dsvw-vd~5023805) previous thread. I consider English Ivy to be AKA urban kudzu.

its usually important to know where you are ... in my cold weather area.. i highly doubt it could take over and harm a tree of this size ....

if you decide to remove it .... cut at ground level.. apply a stump killer ... and let it hang there for a few months.. or over winter ...and by spring it will have dried enough.. that you can pull it out/off the tree ... a lot easier than if you dont ... [just a drip or two.. on the cut ....]

ken

I don't mind it climbing and covering the trunk - it does no harm to the trees and providers a great habitat for nesting birds as well as a terrific late source of nectar and pollen for overwintering bees (only in mature fruiting stages of ivy). However, if it gets up into the canopy, the sail effect can destabilise a tree (especially the tall, shorter-lived poplars which characterise my woodland ecology.

I will infuriate the group thinkers by saying although Ivy should be considered a problem on the east coast, it's not as harmful as various other weeds with which it completes. (it's more of a threat in the PNW so I'm discounting that from my analysis)

As I've said before we've permanently and wholly altered the entire biome of the northeastern US. There is no hope to reversing this; the only sensible thing is to try to protect the few islands of truly "virgin" forest/ecosystem/biome left. And practice harm reduction, not pie in the sky tomfoolery, everywhere else. If you could magically snap your fingers and make Hedera disappear entirely, other far more horrible (poison ivy) and aggressive (Celastrus) invasive weeds and natives will just take its place. It actually does a semi-good job keeping those in check when growing as a ground cover. Should the adult form be removed when found? Sure. Should people be discouraged from planting it? Probably. * Should it be removed from some really remote outpost of, say, the southern Appalachians if it's never been found there before? Yes. Should thousands of man hours be wasted removing it from places like urban parks that are isolated from what's left of large, pristine woodlands? No. Especially since, without the sort of serious, thoughtful maintenance we skimp on in the US**, other weeds are just going to move in. (or more Ivy, once yuppie volunteers want to do something else to 'help the environment') I remember years ago someone in Montgomery county telling me their family was volunteering time to remove it from some minor parkland in the middle of that county, presumably in the Rock Creek watershed. It wasn't a place like McCrillis. What an exercise in futility! It's surrounded by acres of wooded suburbia where, guess what...a bunch of people have ivy in their garden.

And furthermore why waste the effort when there are other things far more pressing? The scariest invasive plant I've ever seen - and this counts seeing patches of kudzu in the south and even here in Cecil County - was a massive infestation of Celastrus along the lower New York State thruway. Had basically strangled and killed at least several hundred acres of trees. I wanted to stop and take a picture but I'm sure it wouldn't have been legal. Never have seen such a forlorn site - it was like invasion of the body snatchers, horticultural or arboricultural edition! You would never see ivy dominate an area like that...at least not in our climate.

* I have lots of ivy on my grounds but have only planted Hedera colchica, which is far less aggressive (again, in our climate at least) and not likely to be invasive. If I ever saw it climbing something - which it doesn't seem to - I'd snip off any adult foliage. It's also not quite as good at suppression of other weeds though, as the wild ivy.

** worth mentioning again that in just 2 weeks in Australia, without looking for such a thing of course, I saw two parties engaged in professional control of invasive weeds. Though I am aware of such work going on in parts of the eastern US, I've never actually seen it happening with my own eyes. Proof that some places are taking it more seriously!

Thanks so much for all the thoughts on my ivy concern. Living in Chicago, the Fall is almost upon us, so going to cut the ivy from the bottom....assuming I can find all the sources. At least I can get a good chunk of it cleared away from the base of the tree.

Ken - what is a stump killer? I have a couple of other vines that I try to cut back each Summer, but grows back and snakes into my bushes!

It will eventually kill the tree, believe me I know. My neighbor down the street let it crawl all over her house. Now she needs to paint and when they tried to remove the ivy the stucco came with it. Pretty big expense for letting a plant grow.

A tree is not a stucco wall :-) So that is not a valid comparison.

I live in the PNW where English or Irish ivy is a major invasive issue. It grows on trees here all over the place, mostly in greenbelt and other natural undeveloped areas as well as in larger parks. And is often intentionally planted in gardens as well. And while it has the potential for killing a tree due to smothering or making the tree unstable, it rarely does. It just uses the trees as a major climbing support.

In a cold Chicago winter climate, I doubt this will ever become an issue. While I certainly wouldn't recommend planting ivy to grow up a tree (unless a dead snag) anywhere, it just will not grow fast enough nor will it be hardy enough in that location to kill the tree in question.

Hedera can be a problem is the coastal south, where its dense, heavy growth can lead to the rot of large tree branches. It especially loves the corky bark of Live Oaks; a neglected crop of ivy climb to the top of a tree and lead to its decline.

Removal of poison ivy and Hedera a very common winter practice along the coast, where Live oaks are treasured above English Ivy.

after you make a cut.. drip the product.. according to the label ....on the cut ... its not a spray thing .... you may have to repeat this for as long as the roots resprout ... when i dealt with a huge poison ivy it took 2 years ....

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=stump+killer+lowes&t=ffcm&ia=products

i use undiluted round up ... which is labeled for such ... and use this applicator .. precise application of the least product ... ken

https://www.google.com/search?q=plochmans+mustard&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=XQTcUYCCC_OFyQGCg4DAAg&biw=1154&bih=805&sei=XwTcUbmZHZK4yAHD0oDYDw

Ken!!! I think their ivy is a landscape groundcover that is starting to climb the tree...they probably don't want to use roundup on it.

Dieback of aerial english ivy in zone 5a or 5b is almost annual (though north facing walls can persist). A little less frequent in zone 6a but still enough that it won't be a tree killing menace in Chicago and certainly doesn't need roundup (unless you want to get it completely out of the garden)

In coastal Northeastern/MidAtlantic Zone 6b/7 plus climates, English ivy becomes an issue on established trees and shrubs. I ripped mine out once they started to climb into and smother a tree canopy of Hemlocks.

In Chicago, I have no idea.

My neighbor has ivy as a groundcover on a slope facing our house. That means that after suffering extreme winterburn, I'm the one who has to look at it, not them. If we have a mild winter this year, it may look halfway decent next August. Right now, it looks half dead. I can't imagine any parts growing up a tree surviving any winter that isn't extremely mild. If the upwards growth all happened this summer, it will probably be toast next spring.

Other considerations aside when a tree gets full of ivy then the ivy becomes the feature instead of the tree. The tree then functioning in the garden merely as the host for the ivy, the support. Instead of as a separate, fully visible landscape element.

You guys must be talking about a different kind of ivy than we have. I've never seen it 'smother a tree'. The ivy here never grows to the top of a living tree, nor very far out on a limb. It tends to hug the trunk. Ivy seems to have a sense of 'presence'. It's not hugging the trunk because it prefers shade. It does well here out in the open on the ground.

I know we are talking about the same ivy, but I wanted to bring out what I think is a common misconception about ivy. I'm not defending it, as I don't like it and wish I had never let it get started in my garden.

The OPs plant is Hedera helix. If yours is also that species Mike its behaviour is perhaps because you have a different climate, not because it’s a different kind of ivy.

MIke, most of the ivy that populates the PNW is Irish ivy, Hedera hibernica. But it is very similar to and almost impossible to differentiate from English ivy, Hedera helix. And has an almost identical growth habit.

When growing "wild" here, it tends not to smother the trees it grows on, simply because it doesn't get that tall. 60-80' up for sure but not much above that. And the Doug firs that seem to be a preferred host can easily get double that. But I have seen it engulf a disused or abandoned garden and climb much smaller growing ornamental trees and smother them. And dozens of large shrubs. In fact, a neighbor has a large (20'+) rhododendron in a yard she no longer bothers to maintain and it is being rapidly consumed by the ivy. And blackberries........both likely 'planted' by visiting birds.