Ivy not dying

I wanted to remove a huge ivy plant growing up a tree behind my house because it seriously blocks light in the winter. I severed the stems around the trunk and waited for the plant to die. The trouble is it took months for the leaves to finally go brown and now that they are brown they are not falling off so it just looks terrible. Even the recent storm barely managed to blow any off. Will the winter cold do it or should I try and get some ladders and start climbing up to pull it off?

 

It may take several years for all leaves to disappear, because the plant has not sealed off its vascular system and corked the joints because you have severed its arteries.
The root may well send up new shoots to recapture its prisoner. Glysophate painted on to newly severed stems(you might need to cut them back to do this)will likely kill the plant entirely, more than one application likely needed.

 

Yes! As @infradig says - I cut all the stems on some suffocating ivy more than a year ago, and it still looks healthy! It takes blasted ages. And you may find you've missed some sneaky growths.

 

We have a big sycamore next door to us that was covered in ivy. Every year we had tree creepers and thrushes and robins and even a lesser spotted woodpecker nesting in the ivy. Then our neighbour decided to cut the ivy off at ground level. Since then we have just had dead brown leaves to look at. No wildlife has gone near it.

 

Seriously - a lesser spotted? That's amazing.
My old Rowan is smothered in ivy, I've occasionally wondered if I should do something about it but it's such a good resource for the wildlife with the shelter, flowers and berries. Having read these accounts I'm definitely not going to bother.

 

It's fine if the trees are healthy, but it can really weigh them down. And my arborist warned that when it gets too much they don't like to do aerial work because they can't find the actual trunk to hitch themselves to, and it's dangerous. So then it's expensive cherry picker hire.
Am I just getting old (no, don't tell me) or are trees much more clothed with it now than they used to be?
My lesser spotted woodpecker lives in the trunk of the oak tree at the bottom of the garden - and comes for easy peanuts to the feeder

 

Ivy has taken over some of my fencing, its a complete menace IMO.
It also spreads along the ground looking for its next victim, it may not actually be a parasite but it certainly likes to take over the world if you take your eye off it.

 

It was lovely last week in our local woods where there is a line of ivy covered trees. The flowers were out and there was a deafening sound of the bees enjoying the nectar.
I know it's claimed that ivy won't hard healthy trees but the amount of ivy clad trunks that have come down in the recent storms, suggests otherwise. The only ivy we have gets limited to a comfortable cutting height where it still flowers but doesn't take over.

 

@Andyspeak Ivy growing up a tree is similar to that growing on a wall or fence. You can cut back to ground level and either dig out or kill the roots but the stems above will not just drop off. If you want a "clean" trunk, you need to physically strip the stems away. A small flat screwdriver is quite useful to get behind the stem and lever it away from the trunk.
Plenty of Ivy here and all flowering away and as said, it's good for the insects and it does provide nesting sites.
It can also be a real PITA if it's in the wrong place.

 

I was trying to remove a load of ivy from some trellis panels which were erected to hide the neighbours sheds. A couple of years ago they removed one shed completely but left the back panel of another in place. When I started cutting away the ivy on that panel the whole thing started to rock into their garden. I stopped and let them know what had happened. They have said they plan to take it down and put up a fence along the entire boundary. Result.