Invasive or aesthetic? Homeowners differ over the ivy creeping up their buildings

When Marilyn Johnson bought her Queen Village condo five years ago, she never noticed the ivy that grew up the side of the building. The creeping vines weren’t visible from the front or back of the building. Once she settled on the property, it didn’t take long for her to discover the problems those vines were causing.

“They are going up on the roof, causing the outside of the building to crack,” Johnson said. “The exterminator said bugs are crawling up the vines, and the HVAC guy said they are eating into the units. Two years ago, the association paid over $1,000 to have them removed. We are small at just six units, so that’s a lot of money for us. And now the vines are completely back.”

Johnson learned that to eradicate the vines permanently, they need to be removed from the bottom. Unfortunately, in her neighborhood where condos and townhouses are built very close together, the root base is on another neighbor’s property. That neighbor likes the ivy and isn’t willing to remove it.

The aesthetics of ivy and other creeping vines are up to the beholder, Johnson has learned. Yet she is paying for the damage they cause.

“There are very different, significant opinions regarding whether you should grow vines on your house,” said Andrew Bunting, vice president of public horticulture at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society.

While all self-clinging vines can creep up buildings, yards and trees, there are many types in the Philadelphia area, and they affect building structures in different ways. Most prevalent are English ivy (Hedera helix), an evergreen, and Boston ivy (Parthenocissus tricuspidata), a deciduous vine that loses its leaves in the fall. Both of these vines are invasives, which mean they spread into and compromise native woodlands, Bunting said.

Some homeowners choose Boston ivy for the deep red color it turns in the fall or English ivy because it stays green in winter, said Dan Cleary, owner of EcoLandscapes Design in Bala Cynwyd. Others enjoy flowering vines, such as climbing hydrangea.

“Hydrangea can climb up a building or trellis, and it’s a pretty plant that has a nice bloom,” Cleary said. “Sometimes in an urban backyard where all the surfaces are concrete, growing a vine can create a green wall to soften things up.”

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Climbing hydrangea is less aggressive than English ivy, as are crossvine, wood vamp, Japanese hydrangea vine, and silvervein creeper.

Care and maintenance of vines depends on the type and where on a building they are creeping. The rootlets in English and Boston ivies can be detrimental to buildings if they get into the mortar joints between bricks or stone, Bunting said.

The tendrils or rootlets from many flowering vines are not as aggressive in how they cling and won’t be as destructive in the same way ivies might be. One potential problem with all clinging vines is that by adhering to a building, they can prevent maintenance such as painting and pointing between the joints.

“It’s a personal choice, but I would grow vines on a stone or brick house, but probably not on a house with wooden or cedar shake siding and definitely not on stucco,” Bunting said. “If you try to pull it off, it takes the stucco with it.”

Bunting appreciates the aesthetics of Parthenocissus henryana, silvervein creeper, crossvine and the Japanese hydrangea vine growing up his Swarthmore home. His regular maintenance includes pruning the vines around the windows and keeping them clear of soffits, fascias and any wooden areas.

“I like the look, but, with any vine, if you let it go, it can almost consume your house,” he said. “They can get into the smallest crevice and can pry open the joints on wood. I keep them pruned around the door jambs and windows.”

To remove vines, Bunting recommends first pulling them off the building by hand. For English ivy, you may need to also use a scraper to detach the rootlets. To remove the plants permanently, you need to dig out the root base.

Ivy has a storied history in the region and is found on many stone houses, buildings, and, of course, the University of Pennsylvania of the Ivy League.

“While not official, most historians agree that [sportswriter] Caswell Adams coined the term Ivy League in a 1937 article,” said Matt Panto, associate executive director of strategic communications and external relations for the Ivy League, based in Princeton. “The story says that he was writing about a Columbia versus Penn football game, and supposedly wrote about the old ‘Ivy-covered’ universities, leading him to call them the ‘Ivy League.’ The story continues that the name stuck, and the 1945 agreement formalized the Ivy League.”

Johnson, meanwhile, is less romantic about the vine and hopes her neighbor will have a change of heart. “If you live in the city, you share space, and we all have to respect each other’s space.”