Question
Do you know of any (preferably 'organic') way of getting rid of the trailing morning glory weed
(other than pulling it out)? It's all throughout
our flowerbeds & on a slope that we planted with fern, myrtle, & shrubbery...and is just too time-consuming to pull constantly.
Thank you for your time.

Answer

Hi Janet;
If those morning glories are a weed, putting dry molasses or sugar should get rid of them.
Weeds won't grow in fertile, rich soil. They like very poor soil.
I had a lot of wild violets in my yard, the only weeds I wanted to keep, but about the second year, after I started putting sugar on my lawn, they stopped coming up.
Apparently these violets are a true weed, and don't like rich soil.
Even if you dump a pound of sugar on each vine, they will still come back next spring, there just won't be as many of them. It would be 2 or 3 years before you would stop seeing any of them, depending on how rich your soil is now.
I can feel your pain, with all that pulling. I think a good bit of my back problems is due to all the weeds I pulled in my lifetime.
  This will get rid of these weeds, and won't harm your soil:
WipeOut is put out by GreenLight.
I like their root stimulator better than any other brand too.
WipeOut will kill any broadleaf plant, and it won't harm grasses.
You don't want a drop of this on any of your other plants growing there, so pick a day when there is no breeze. And of there weeds that are well away from other plants, you can spray. I load up a spray bottle. You don't have to saturate the plant and soil. WipeOut absorbs through the leaves, stems and roots, if you put it on the ground.So if you just get it on the leaves and stems, it will kill them.
I don't want any of it to get into my soil, and I don't want any of it to get where my toads, grass snakes and lizards will be harmed, so for the viney, BIG problem weeds I have, I mix up 1 part WipeOut to 2 parts water, and paint it on several of the leaves. You don't have to get every leaf. The WipeOut absorbs, and travels to the tap root of the plant, and kills it. where I can (among my roses, for instance) I cover the other plants with a plastic
sheet, spray the weed till it is wet on most of it's leaves. Then I wrap plastic wrap loosely around that (to keep the lizards, cats and other animals away from it, take the plastic sheet off the other plants, and next day, or later that day, if you do this in the morning, take the plastic off the weed. It won't hurt if it stays on there though.
By using a more concentrated form of WipeOut, that weed is going to look sickly within a matter of hours, and probably next day, will be dead. At any rate, you can cut that weed. close to the ground and remove the wilted, sickly part, and see it no more. You just want the WipeOut to get to that tap root. If after about 4 to 6 hours, you don't see that weed dieing, you can re-treat it.
The only weeds I have had to treat more than once, are the pecan trees the squirrels seed into my climbing roses. That tap root goes so much deeper than other plants.
Now, making the soil nice and rich will not keep trees from coming up, in fact, trees love rich soil, and those little seedlings will grow faster.
My back won't allow me to dig out these trees that spring up. On a hot day, I take a black plastic bag out, and put it over the sapling, and tie it at the bottom. In a couple of days in the Texas sun kills that little sucker out nicely.It literally cooks it. You can also paint WipeOut on these little sapling tree leaves, and it will kill out their tap root. The stem (trunk?) will turn black, and in a few weeks, you can just pluck it out with a slight tug. After it dies, the roots begin to rot, and in a couple of weeks, there is nothing holding the tree in the ground.
I would throw some sugar on the ground around those shrubs, that will start the enriching, and those shrubs and plants will just be more beautiful.
I tried the dry molasses, but I really like the results I get from sugar, better. I use 1 pound sugar per 250-300 sq.ft.
I have a vine that used to come in every few years to deal me grief. It has a trumpet shaped flower, like  morning glory, but it is a small white flower. This weed is especially obnoxious to pull, as it has a lot of sticky, white milk in the stems. You can hardly stand the sticky feel till you get it washed off, and it is hard to wash off.Since I started using sugar, that weed doesn't come back anymore.
Anything I can help you with, especially organics, I am glad to do.
Write me any time.
Charlotte