Ask Mr. Smarty Plants

Rosa laevigata (Cherokee rose), while it is considered an "antique" or "heirloom" rose, it is not a plant native to North America, but to China and Vietnam. We could not agree with you more about the use of herbicides on your property. You must feel like the Prince in Sleeping Beauty, trying to go through a wall of thorns. Herbicides, however, are not the solution. To begin with, you can make a plant the size of a mesquite a little sick, but it probably won't die, and even if it dies, you still need to remove it. Same thing with the roses, they are survivors with deep, well-established roots, and they are not going to go away willingly.

You are going to have to have some help, with equipment, to make your pond accessible and poison-free. We recommend using a tractor-mounted shredder or bush-hog to decapitate the plants to the point where they can get heavy chains around the trunks of the indiviual plants and snatch them out of the ground with the same tractor.  And please, stop with the poisons. You may be contaminating your soil, not to mention the pond water which receives runoff from the soil, killing plants you would like to keep, and it still won't do what you want done.