Bulb log 46 Liverworts

[gote]

I hate liverwoth. Unlike other weeds that compete for light, space and nutrition, Liverworths murder by suffocation.  
Also I remove them by mechanical means but I have been told that they cannot stand darkness. That will make sense in a pot sown with say Leucojum since these will not show above ground until next spring. It is not helpful when they try to murder a Saxifraga.

LD Hills (The propagation of Alpines) advocates the use of potassium permanganate. I have never tried since he writes that the solution should be of such a strength that it look slike a x-penny stamp. (I do not remember which stamp).
Hills' advice is usulally very helpful but #A I did not have any British stamps, #B he does not say what thickness of the solution that gives the same colour. Thus I never tried it.
He also states that it forces earthworms in pots to the surface.

Question: has anyone tried this chemical against liverworth (or earth worms) and if so, at what strength.

Göte

[Maggi Young]

This is intriguing.... I'm on the trail of the quote, and the stamp!!

[Michael J Campbell]

I just spray the pots with  diluted vinegar and I also wash the greenhouse windows with it, stops them turning green in the winter.

[Maggi Young]

Now then...... first point, Ian says he has never succeeded with the potassium permanganate treatemnt... at whatever solution!

 Second point, with the help of my dear friend Derek Bacon, who checked Hills' quotation for me .....and reports that Hills wrote it should be pink not purple about the colour of a three penny stamp ((and that was written in 1950)), it should be in every can of water used.

 So, went on search for representation of Three penny ( 3d) stamp of the period..... some slight variation...but you get the drift.....


this first set is the nearest colour to the actual standard 3d 1950 version!


This one from 1949


this a little later from 1960




this one circa 1950 Guernsey.... whic again is a good match to the first set when seen at same size.

[gote]

Thank you Maggie.
I would now be able to print my own three-penny stamps to compare with solutions of permanganate. (Hopfully without being caught as a counterfeiter  ;Dt)
However, if it does not help for Ian (at whatever the concentration), it will not help for me (even in the same concentration  ) and I do not need to try to figure it out using counterfit postage 
Cheers
Göte

PS
I would like to have a patent medicine against it. I once had a full square meter of the stuff in a nursery bed.

[Maggi Young]

We have rather too much of the stuff here.... the liverwort that is.Must try the diluted vinegar though I seem to recall dabbing the cups with vinegar in the past without much effect......but if it works for Michael I'll try again.

 I must say, I thought the notion of Forumists printing outmoded stamps to get a colour match with a bucketful of water and potassium permanganate crystals was a most amusing one, with great prospects as a spectator sport 

[derekb]

Gote,
       I first got Hills book when I started with the AGS back in the 50s then like all people when you have a new hobby I ended up with hundreds of pots of seed and I started to use it then and found if you use it before the liverwort started to grow it did keep it away but if it was already growing it took a long time.
Hope this helps,
Derek

[Maggi Young]

if you use it before the liverwort started to grow it did keep it away

 AHA! There we have it... there's often a clue ,y'know!
 Thanks Derek!

[Michael J Campbell]

 Does Armillatox not kill liverwort? I used to use it for to control moss and vineweevils.

[Michael J Campbell]

Maggi,if the liverwort is covering the whole pot I use the vinegar undiluted with a small paintbrush,works a treat,although you still have to pick it off when it is dead.

[Lesley Cox]

I have used Potassium permanganate (Condy's chrystals) at a deeper colour than the stamps and found it pretty much useless for liverwort but it did bring up the worms - don't know whether every one though - in troughs and pots. I occasionally use vinegar but have found that though it kills the liverwort at 1:1 with water, the leaching also kills everything else, even small dormant bulbs so mostly I don't use it now. I lost whole batches of Trillium rivale which were totally below the surface level of pots but nearby trays of same size plants that were not painted with the vinegar solution came up, through the liverwort. And yes, the dead liverwort still has to be removed and the "roots" (don't know the technical name for the stuff that holds it in place) pull up big blobs of soil or compost with them, a problem if the liverwort is on seed pots so overall, I prefer to deal with live liverwort and now I do this by carefully cutting it off with a scalpel, wielded at a very low angle, almost parallel with the pot surface, slicing until it is through. The rooty stuff stays but after a while dies away.

Roundup on a path always works very well to kill liverwort but after a short while it grows back stronger than ever (likewise, moss). It is definitely preferable with pots, troughs or anywhere reasonably small, to attach the beastly stuff at the very beginning of its appearance rather than let it form big patches.

Having said all that, there are botanists in the world who LOVE liverworts and spend their whole lives studying them. Some might say they are sad people.

[Roma]

Having said all that, there are botanists in the world who LOVE liverworts and spend their whole lives studying them. Some might say they are sad people.
[/quote]

I have met them, Lesley.  When I worked at the Cruickshank Garden at Aberdeen University we had to leave some liverwort and mosses on pots so they could be used for botany classes.

[Gerry Webster]

Having said all that, there are botanists in the world who LOVE liverworts and spend their whole lives studying them. Some might say they are sad people.

When I was a young teenager (a very long time ago) I was fascinated by liverworts (& mosses); they are indeed fascinating. This fascination - along with others - resulted in my becoming a professional biologist, though not a botanist. "Sad people"?  Why is an interest in liverworts any more sad than having an interest in Crocus, Narcissus, Galanthus etc? I can think of worse things to be interested in.

[Maggi Young]

Gerry, perhaps it is the fact of an interest in something which so many of us spend such a lot of time trying to be rid of.... that's certainly sad for the lovers of the liverworts!

[Lesley Cox]

So sorry Gerry, it was a tongue-in-cheek comment, as many of mine are. Forgive me? Please?