Hack and Squirt

[Troubles Trees]

I tried using the search feature on this site to find posts about hack and squirt to see what the general advice is. It only took me to a couple off topic comments about it so I figured I’d start one and ask everyone.
I’ve read quite a bit about H&S, and watched a few videos, but I’ve never done it and I have about 4-5 acres of trees (mostly maple, poplar, and ironwood kind of stuff) that I want to open up for more room to plant. I plan on hinge cutting the smaller trees with a chainsaw, and hack and squirt the bigger stuff. I do know the risks of leaving dead trees standing, but this isn’t an area normally travelled often, and not an area I need to go in after replanting.
I have a quart of RM-45, RM-45 is 43% Glyphosate so I’m assuming it is good to use for the H&S application?
If so do I mix with water or use it straight out of the jug?
I know fall is the ideal time of year so is it the wrong time of year now here in NY or am I ok? I’d like to plant there this fall and/or next spring, mostly shrubs and berry bushes that wouldn’t take a beating if a dead tree fell on them like an fruit or nut tree would be affected.

I have had 2 loggers here to look at removing 8-10 acres of trees that only serve as shade trees, there are a few Butternut and a few very small oaks I want to leave. It was growing some understory plants and shrubs like wetland rose when I first bought it, but the canopy closed in the last 5 years I’ve owned it and today the forest floor is nearly barren. The only real green there is Leeks in the spring.
Prior to me purchasing the land, they had all the mature trees removed (10 years or so prior to buying) so both the loggers that did a walkthrough for me weren’t interested because “the trees needed another 10-15 years.” I asked a friend if he wanted it for firewood and he wasn’t interested because it’s a tough to get to spot with his truck and trailer.
I’ve simply ran out of room to plant, and need to provide more cover at the same time, so any advice is appreciated guys.

 

[WeedyJ]

Recent article I read says H&S works year round. Some very heavy sap producers are tough in the spring, but most are fine year round. Also study showed 500% increase in biomass with a 30% reduction in canopy cover. Craig Harper uses a mix of triclopyr and imazapyr, but I know folks who swear glyphosate will do the job.

 

[Troubles Trees]

Recent article I read says H&S works year round. Some very heavy sap producers are tough in the spring, but most are fine year round. Also study showed 500% increase in biomass with a 30% reduction in canopy cover. Craig Harper uses a mix of triclopyr and imazapyr, but I know folks who swear glyphosate will do the job.

Great input Weedy, thank you sir!

 

[jremmons]

We normally use 50% glyphosate, though I imagine you can use even lower amounts if you really dig into the species you are treating. We tend to not use triclopyr for this as it is simply more expensive but seemingly no more effective.

Normally our main H&S time is the summer as that's when I hire a seasonal employee, as the rest of us are a bit too busy to do much H&S work; we've also done it in the fall and winter when we don't have much else going on. The only time I wouldn't recommend it is spring when plants are building up leaves, etc; lots of sap liquid flow seems to push out the bulk of the injected herbicide.

 

[yoderjac]

This OPs question started in a PM to me and I ask him to post a new thread so others could benefit. The following is cut from my reply to his PM:

Unless there is personal data or something involved, questions like this are better asked on the forum. There are several reasons for this. First, if you have a question, there are probably a bunch of other folks with the same question that could benefit from the thread. Second, and more important, there are probably others on the forum more experienced in any specific area than I am, you will get a variety of perspectives. I don't have time to read every thread on the forum, so if you ask a question there, and want me to address it specifically, feel free to drop me a PM with a link to the thread. I'll make sure I read that one and respond.

I'll try to answer this one here. If you decide to post the question to a new thread, I'll cut and paste my answer there for others.

The first comment I have is related to the danger of killing a large tree and letting it stand. Sure, trees die in nature and eventually fall, and there is always the off chance one will fall and hit you. However, when you kill a large number of trees in an area, you increase that risk both by the number of dead trees as well as the amount of time you are likely to be there working.

If a tree is too large for me to take down with a chainsaw, I'm probably not going to kill it.

Having said that, it takes a while for a tree to become dangerous after it dies. I find it much easier to get large trees to fall where I want them to when trees are dormant. When you try to cut down a tree and it hangs in the canopy of another, you create another danger. We call these widow makers. So, if I working on a project and can't finish during dormant season, I'll kill the trees and let them die. I'll then fell them when I have time.

There are a number of ways to kill trees. The larger the tree, in general, the harder they are to kill. For many trees, especially when they are smaller (say less than 10" in diameter), you can basal spray or paint the bark. There are a lot of options for this and each has a different level of effectiveness on different kinds of trees. Mixing Garlon 4, and diesel fuel is one combo with or without gly. There are other herbicides like garlon that can be used. You don't mix these with water like when spraying fields. Another method is hack & squirt. With this method, you use a hatchet to hack through the cambium layer and spray the herbicide into the cut from a spray bottle. The number of hacks around the tree depends on the diameter. Just one or two works on small trees and larger harder to kill trees may require more.

For large trees, another method is to ring them with a chain saw. You are simply cutting a ring the entire ways around the tree to break the cambium layer between the roots and top. I usually use two rings to be sure. I also squirt the bottom ring like hack and squirt unless I want the stump to sprout water sprouts.

You mention wanting more area to plant. It is one thing to hinge cut trees or cut them down forming mineral stumps (see MSU podcast) in order to open up the canopy for native foods to grow. It is another thing to clear land to plant. It would be a very long arduous job to try to clear enough area to plant this way.

If you are gong to clear for planting, you might consider using the trees as firewood. It is likely not enough acreage to interest a timber company unless you have some very larger diameter trees with no lower branches. Presuming that is not the case, there are probably folks who sell firewood. You could probably make arrangement with them to fell the trees and take the wood to sell for firewood for free. They may even pay you something. Either way, you get rid of the trees.

Again, posting this to a thread will give you more ideas and guys who do hack and squirt much more than I do. They can advise on specific herbicide combinations.

Thanks,

Jack