I ride a fair bit in unmanaged woodland. Trees regularly get downed in high wind, and they usually have their canopy weighted in ivy. Some trees have had the ivy vines cut, but there’s loads that don’t. The ivy vines range from 1/2″ to 3″ so pretty established. Will the trees / woodland benefit from having their ivy vines severed?

Ta

Not really. Cutting it will unbalance the tree.

Plus the bees love it and provides late necter.

Cutting it will unbalance the tree

Really? Perhaps a young tree, but an established tree with roots? Maybe maybe not.

We have a lot of ivy covered tree’s in our area, mainly big oak’s. The ivy always looks like it’s strangling the tree to me, inhibits leaf growth and ensures the early demise of its host. So I say cut about a foot or so from each vine a little way up the trunk of the tree. I would say that the tree is happier for it.

Take the point about pollen and bee’s.

The gamekeeper likes it because it can provide roosting cover for his pheasant’s and partridge’s. Although they all seem way too happy being on the ground and doing as little flying as possible. Probably because they know what happens when they do fly 😉

The trees in our garden in Ireland looked much better after cutting the ivy on them, so I’ll vote cut it.

Cut. I had a 4 inch layer on the poor strangled apple tree that I cut down when I moved in.

It depends how established it is.
I cut the ivy from a few trees on my land, and within a couple of weeks 3 trees had fallen down.
So if the vines are very thick, they may be supporting the tree, so leave well alone.

Just to clarify, are you suggesting doing this on someone else’s land? If so I don’t think you should be doing this without permission.

Ivy doesn’t strangle trees, it has a symbiotic relationship with the tree rather than a parasitic one. Lots of creatures depend on the ivy , so be nice to them and leave it alone

Cut it, horrible stuff.

Depends on what stage of its life the tree is at. Young trees can he hindered or deformed. In the last throws, the weight of the ivy can be what finishes them, but then the tree is dieing by that point anyway.
We only really clear ivy on trees that we are inspecting regularly. Too many trees to do them all.
As mentioned, ton of invertebrates to be found amongst it.

What mildbore said. If a tree is already in poor health then the added wind loading might finish it off sooner but that’s it. Ivy is great for roosting small birds in the winter and the flowers are a good late season source of nectar. Why do people constantly want to tidy everywhere?

Edit: too slow!

I know most advice is to leave it, but a hawthorn in our garden was getting swamped when we moved in so we cut the ivy. The tree seems much better 2 years later.

A: https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=192

If so I don’t think you should be doing this without permission.

This +1

Our local council cut the ivy stems every couple of years in the parks and open spaces .

From the link above – Ivy growing on trees is often thought to be a serious problem, endangering the health of even very large trees. However, its presence on the trunk is not damaging and where it grows into the crown this is usually only because the trees are already in decline or are diseased and slowly dying.

And quite often it grows on trees already dying.

So in a natural environment (not in your garden) leave it the **** alone – it can provide bat roosts, habitat for bird nests and as above it gives late nectar for bees.

I volunteer for the NT as a gardener, we do remove ivy from trees but only when the tree is swamped with stuff (cleared one yesterday and the Ivy’s stems were bigger than my arms)

It is very satisfying to remove and fun can be had swinging off it