some years ago, one of my work collegues was telling me a story about how his neighbor planted a tree...right on the border of their houses. he tried to explain to the guy that it may be ok for now, but in 20 years, its going to enroach onto his side of the boundry etc. the neighbor said basically...'who cares'. my mate then put a copper nail in the young tree and watch it eventually start to die. then he removed the nail and covered up the hole with bark. mission accomplished. i used to have a neighbor who bought an the equally old house next to me, and it already had a variety of trees, right on our border. sure enough most encroach, and one dumps everything it s got into my gutters....so when he put the 'for sale' sign up....i bought some copper nails and put them in about 3 of the worst trees. 6 months down the track....no sign of death. if anything they are flourishing. maybe it only works on young trees? maybe they are bronze nails? either way im still stuck with them.
if its a BIG tree, it needs BIG copper nails. you have to get deep down into the tree before it will start killing it. EDIT: or, wait until the new owners move in, and ask them if they can trim/remove the tree, and offer to pay some of the removal cost?
Get a drill..... with a long bit. Drill diagonally downward in the base of the trunk and fill the hole with concentrated glyphosphate (weed killer). I've used this method with trees on my own property which were growing under power lines. These were 3-4m sapplings. One hole with a 10mm bit killed them in a few weeks. You may need a few holes if the trees are big.
Its not possible to kill a tree with a copper nail from my understanding. This is for a couple of reasons: 1. The amounts of copper in the nail are not enough to actually kill the tree 2. The tree cannot access the copper in the nail anyway Its a myth.
the positive to using thewheeldeel's idea is you can pop the plug back into the hole you drilled, no one will see it.
It must suck to live next to someone that stupid. I have seen a tree (pine) planted under the eave of a house, i will have to remember to note the house number and come back in a few years to see the outcome.
