Hi Newby ~ I am afraid I don't have much advice for you but hopefully someone knowledgeable will come along. I am, however very interested in your post. I, too am new to WI. We've been here about a year now. Along with our house, we got a thick, long border of overgrown buckthorn on our property line too. It was a mess with tangled, rusted barbed wire fencing intertwined in there too. My husband spent months cutting all the buckthorn down. He burned it, bonfire style on the edge of our property. Our problem is that it keeps coming back. Everywhere there is a buckthorn stump there are new 'sprouts'. We weren't surprised by this just not sure what the solution is. My husband has been spraying and/or painting (depending on the area) the stumps and 'suckers' with Round Up. It's like a never-ending job though. I guess I am just warning you that if it isn't "dead!!" it will come back. Hopefully, someone can advise us. I DEFINITELY would NOT use is as wood chips. It might be okay but I know for as much as we are trying to rid ourselves of the invasive buckthorn I JMO
Jennie

The seeds could be viable, but it could also be a little too early. Either common buckthorn or glossy buckthorn's seeds are viable around July, the other around September or October. I can't remember which is which. I know that is not much help. I had a buckthron tree and would be leary about making more problems. Your county or city might have a waste drop off area, or if you live in the country burning is the best way to go.

No, don't chip it and spread it under anything. The seeds are viable for @ 6 years. Birds eat the berries as a last resort and since they have a strong laxative effect, the birds very quickly deposit the seeds complete with fertilizer and, voila, buckthorn everywhere. Good idea to try to eliminate them before they start setting fruit.

As a rule, city or municipal composting sites will take buckthorn for disposal. Also, tool rental places and many hardware stores have tools for yanking it up - weed wreches, and lever-type prybars - it's supposed to be somewhat shallow rooted. I'd get the debris off my property - I don't have it, but it's invading a lot of our woodlands here and there's a major effort to eliminate it.

Thanks everyone!

We're going to burn it. We'd have to rent a truck and then pay the composting site to take the brush, and that gets too pricey.

Learningasigo-- I'm still new at this too, but the Minnesota DNR mentions covering the stumps with black plastic, or even a can will keep a stump from resprouting. I may try that, since the buckthorn I just took out is not in a real visible part of our yard. Another idea could be weed-blocking fabric-- the former owner of our house took out a lot of buckthorn and put down a lot of weed-blocking fabric, and it does seem to help. It makes it easier to pull the new seedlings too. I'm assuming there's more buckthorn in your area and the birds will bring seeds back to your yard.

Greetings fellow buckthorn eradicators. My favorite way to dispose buckthorn is to burn it. I have to caution that this year it may be too dry in MN to do this, but last summer and again last fall, we had giant buckthorn bonfires. AND the best part was that as the buckthorn burned, and the sparks rose up from the fire, each spark looked like it had a streamer attached. Like sparks from fireworks, only linear and vertically floating upward. Yes, an adult beverage or 2 had been consumed, but others observed this, and I was wondering if any of you had seen this phenomenon. We've burned other kinds of wood, and this didn't happen, and we even switched from buckthorn to oak in these fires, and it stopped, then back to buckthorn and it resumed. Please, someone else tell me you have seen this. THANKS. Wojjie [in MN]

Hi all ~ We are exhausted from months of dealing with the buckthorn problem. We burned all the brush we cut down with no problem. We just burned it bonfire style. But we are having a horrific problem stopping it from coming back. We have little "trees" popping up all over especially around the tree stumps. My husband burned the stumps and we've sprayed the heck out of them. It still comes back. The idea of black bags around the stumps might work but quite frankly we have way too many to try that. We continue to spray because it is really all we know to do. We should have taken out stock in Round Up.
Jennie

Hi Everyone -
Please see this website for comprehensive buckthorn information.

http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/invasives/fact/buckthorn_com.htm

We cut ours down at ground level early this summer. Next to tackle is the honeysuckle... (and you can find info about that here: http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/invasives/fact/honeysuckle_tart.htm)

Here is a link that might be useful: invasives - buckthorn

Hi all. I have had good luck with Triclopyr 4, oil based. poison needs to be applied before or after spring and early summer growth. i understand fall is best.

Paint the stumps with an herbicide rated for brush and shrubs.. You just need to do it on fresh cuts, right where the bark meets the inner wood of the stem. My favorite is 40% glyphosate.

For new seedlings that sprout, I use a pair of large pliers to pull them.