Decided to experiment (AKA play) and transplant a 20' Tall willow into a renovation project. Transplanted the tree last year while working and got it to take good root. The attached picture is the top of the tree that has survived this summer in around 15' of water.

BTW Leaking is not a concern where this Willow was transplanted and would not recommend doing where that would be an issue.

Interesting.

That's neat.. Do you plan on it making it through winter if it freezes?

That is neat, please update us after winter.

Willows are very hardy. You can just clip a branch off and stick it in wet soil and it will root.

About the only thing they cannot take is a drought... like the one we had this summer (still going on, but less). Soo dry 1/2 of my weeping willow died, which is nowhere near the pond.

I'm still fighting these damn willows in my dam.. Completely dug them out when the water dropped from drought trees that have been gone underwater for the last 2 yrs are all growing again.. Really don't know if I'll ever beat them..

I used CARMEX, don't know the generic name, to kill young willows on the dam and around pond edges. Two years and no re-sprouting yet!

It's sort of a PITA, but put some Tordon RTU in a small can or mason jar. Have a 1" wide paint brush in there too. When you cut down a willow, paint the freshly stump with Tordon RTU. They shouldn't come back.

There's hundreds of them pencil size impossible to paint.. And I don't think carmex is good for ponds..

You're right on both counts.

I am hoping it will survive the winter also. Here we will only get a light layer of Ice on the ponds. My thinking is the willow is so hard to kill that as long as some of it remains above the surface it should survive as well.

I did the same thing when my pond was filling. We were in the second year of a drought and the pond had filled about 1/3 of the way. I noticed 3 locations where willow trees had begun to grow in tight groups. I figured they would be great cover once the pond was filled so I let them grow with intentions to kill them and cut them before the pond was full so they were roughly 1' under the surface at full pool. I did not realize how hard they would be to kill. After 3 treatments of cutting the tops and brushing the top of the stems with straight Grazon P+D, they finally gave up.





While trying to kill them:


gone:

You should go out to it and see if you've got any new growth.. That'd be a really good sign..

It has been my experience that some willow roots can grow up to near 40 feet. Pretty much as long as they can get near water and be exposed to open air / sunlight they can grow. I auctually physically walk around ponds from time to time pulling any new trees up and get all the roots I can. I then lay them out to dry before disposing in the dumpster. You may want to consider getting an excavator and removing them and refilling area with clay. It has been my take that a bulldozier will only spread some roots around while removing the problem it may create a later problem.

I did remove them with a Backhoe, must of missed some roots.. I pulled all of them by hand last year with a tractor, roots will grow way over 40' you can pull and follow roots 100+'.. they were gone all year until the drought when my water dropped 3' and roots that were submerged and must of been dormant have all sprouted now I have 100's of fresh little trees and I can almost guarantee they are connected to one root source..