Beautiful, Despicable, Destructive Kudzu And It’s Similarly Destructive Foe
Posted: Friday, October 21, 2011
by Joel Hendon
http://hebronics.org/index.html
During the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the U.S. at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1876, Kudzu was first brought to this country. The various countries were invited to build a display depicting their own country.The group from Japan built theirs as a beautiful garden display. The large luxurious leaves and sweet smelling blossoms enticed American gardeners to grow some for ornamental plants. The operators of a Florida nursery learned that livestock ate the plant with gusto, so they began to sell it to be grown for feedstuff.
During the great depression, came the big mistake. The government, it’s efforts to put people to work, hired hundreds of young men to set out kudzu plants to stop and prevent soil erosion on farm hillsides, with the farmers consent of course, but all having no idea of the rapacious growth, land grabbing, tree killing nuisance it would become. Since there were many bare hillsides which had eroded to the point of being non-arable, the land owners welcomed the free erosion stopper. And indeed it did. Once the plant became established, it rapidly covered the area with it’s strong, tough vines and enormous root system. It has been spreading throughout the south at approximately 150,000 acres annually.
The stuff grew (grows) so fast that all manner of exaggerations became
popular. Some say that if you go away for an overnight stay, to be sure and close all windows and doors or your furniture will be covered with kudzu when you return. Here is a blurb from kudzu files.com. (Kudzu seedpods-Wikipedia)People have been known to leave home on vacation down here only to return a week later to find cars and other LARGE objects buried under it’s lush greenery. It climbs telephone poles and crosses wires.
That may be a little exaggerated but not very much. Others say it will grow a yard in length overnight which I can almost accept as fact. The stuff is beautiful in summer, lush and green and in winter it appears dead but still offers a smooth, clean appearance. It has blossoms in spring but they are not very obvious. You can see them if you are standing nearby.
Stopping it has proven to be an extremely formidable task. It can be stopped, but it takes time and expense. Heavy grazing by cattle will eventually kill it. But it involves having to move the cattle off of it when they graze it down and put them where they have other grazing. Then, as sprouts appear to the point of offering grazing food again, the cattle must be put back on to it. Hogs do a reasonable job also, they even root up some of the root crowns., but again…it is a slow process.
THEN! In 2009, first found in northeast Georgia, the Megacopta cribraria, also called the Bean Plataspid, Kudzu Bug, Globular Stink Bug or Lablab Bug appears! This bug sucks juice from the stems of several plants, kudzu being one of them. And where they have infested a patch of kudzu, they have done appreciable damage.
It is categorized as an invasive species and rightfully so. Along with it’s appetite for kudzu, which is wonderful, it’s down side is that it also loves wisteria, green beans, other legumes and SOY BEANS! Soy beans is a large money crop in the south and it’s destruction will cost the farmers billions of dollars. So the dilemma is how to save the soy beans but eradicate the kudzu. Kudzu would be a welcome guest if it could be reasonably controlled and so would be the kudzu or global stink bug. If it could be kept in the kudzu.
I suggest they alter some genes of the bug using some features from the common toad frog, so it will grow large enough to suck the kudzu dry but can still be shot with a rifle. But if they got too big, one might pop his tongue out and swallow my cat Tillie. I wouldn’t want that to happen.
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Joel, you made me laugh. I remember the first time I saw Kudzu. We took a trip to Florida in 2001 and I asked about it because it was beautiful. Wow - I got an earful from the locals! Soy beans may not continue to be a major crop in the next few years. We Americans took the Asian condiment and turned it into the main event. Now, some years later, it is being discovered that soy can be harmful. It messes with the thyroid. Those with chronic or autoimmune diseases are told to stay away from soy; hard to do since it is in everything now. Vegetable cooking oil is now 100% soy. Companies are starting to list "no soy" on products now, but for some it may have causes irreparable damage. As always, I loved reading your stuff! Have a great weekend!Thank you Lorrie for you kind comment. I really couldn't care any less that Soy beans might disappear. I've never liked anything cooked from them and there is a taste about Chinese Food which I do not like and I'm guessing that is it. However, I do feel sorry for the farmers who have sunk piles of money into equipment and in raising the stuff. You are right though, when I see a big area of the stuff, it makes me gasp, it so pretty.
Ugh, I hate kudzu. Loved the article. :) It brought back memories of driving down I95 through Georgia and the Carolinas and seeing all the trees covered in kudzu vines.Yes, it looks kindly like a ghost town doesn't it? Thanks for the comment.
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