[Granville-Hough] more on kudzu

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

From: harold hopkins <hhopkins3 at comcast.net>
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2010 09:38:12 -0700

Here's something I  wrote about 20 years ago  on kudzu for one of the 
Smith County papers when I was living at Mize for a time.  I guess I 
never sent a copy to Granville.   Harold Hopkins


	Kudzu:  Space invader

     	by Harold Hopkins

     A traveler from Mize to Taylorsville, or to Raleigh, Magee, Mt. 
Olive, or just about any place in Smith or other counties in  our state 
will not go far before encountering one or more rampant roadside 
colonies of  a  plant known as Pueraria lobata, more commonly, kudzu.

     Like a number of other unwelcome foreign plants, this Asian 
member of the pea family originally was imported as a curiosity. After 
being introduced in 1876, it quickly got out of hand, as might any form 
of life that grows a foot a day and sixty feet a year. Every year kudzu 
gains new footholds and each colony quickly envelops the surrounding 
area, climbing and overshading and killing any plant that it embraces in 
its aggressive clasp,  including trees of timber size. By the time one 
discovers kudzu on his property it's almost too late. A  kudzu colony 
makes the land it envelops unfit for anything except as host to this 
unwelcome guest.

     I've heard several stories of how kudzu came to be so much with us: 
that highway agencies and railroads planted it on the sides of new-cut 
roads to prevent erosion; that the U.S. Soil Conservation Service in the 
1930s furnished plants by the millions to farmers to plant in eroded 
spots. It was a case of dealing with a problem, but failing to look 
ahead at the possible consequences. That kind of incaution is how we got 
many unwelcome foreign plants that escaped from cultivation and 
encountered no natural enemies in the countryside to keep them in check.

     Since row crop acreage in this part of our state has been 
drastically reduced from that of the past,  and since most of the roads 
have been laid out, cut, and even paved,   erosion is not the problem it 
once was. But kudzu, one of the consequences, is still with us and is 
not going to go away. Laying blame for incautious acts of the past is a 
waste of time.  But doing something about what kudzu has done to us 
isn't, and ridding our country  of it should be everybody's business.

     Hereabouts, tree farming is a  major agricultural activity. Kudzu 
not only kills existing trees, but covers the ground and prevents the 
natural growth or cultivation of new seedlings of other plants. Millions 
of acres mostly in the South are now covered with kudzu, and more and 
more land will be made useless as kudzu colonies spread and envelop new 
tracts.

     Various federal and state government agencies and universities 
throughout the South  -- where kudzu has done its worst  -- say that 
mechanical removal of kudzu is now an impossibility; that chemical 
control is the only practical means to control it.  Even so, getting 
kudzu under control costs about $500 per acre, often as expensive as the 
value of the land itself.  Since some kudzu patches are now a hundred 
acres in area, imagine how expensive chemical control would be!

     Some of these agencies -- who advise timber interests -- say that 
herbicides are not nearly as ecologically damaging or dangerous to 
humans and other forms of non-plant life as are insecticides,  and when 
applied in solid form,  are not as pervasive and widespreading as 
liquid, sprayed forms. I make no judgment on that, but I do think the 
time has come to do whatever can be done to combat this creeping plant. 
Studies show that some herbicides are much more effective against kudzu 
than others. Excellent papers have been written within the past 10 years 
about kudzu and its control by James H. Miller of the U.S. Forest 
Service at Auburn, AL, and Andrew W. Ezell of the Mississippi 
Cooperative Extension Service at Mississippi State University.

     Timber interests that own forest acreage use chemicals to keep 
their tracts free of competing plants and have contacts with chemical 
herbicide makers and applicators. They are better able than individuals 
to chemically protect their forest trees against kudzu invasions.  But 
what about the rest of us?  An owner of a few acres or fifty or a 
hundred acres may  not be able to go after a kudzu colony aggressively 
because of the time and expense required. Yet, if kudzu is not 
controlled it remains a threat to all landowners and is an offensive 
sight to residents and tourists alike.  Heavy growths of kudzu are 
somewhat reminiscent of imagined lunar landscapes or slimes and other 
creepers in science horror movies.  They can produce a shudder on the 
hottest day. So can kudzu.

     The kudzu explosion has reached a point beyond the initiative and 
capability  of individuals to keep it in check. It should be controlled. 
When I see prisoners out picking up trash along the highways, I think 
how much better it would be if they were assailing tracts of kudzu 
instead. Since the government had a hand in introducing kudzu, it should 
have an obligation to provide a remedy and to remove its threat, and 
landowners who find their property overrun by kudzu planted along a 
highway long ago should be in a legal position to hold the responsible 
parties liable for the damage.

      I believe that Mississippi and the rest of the South should give  
kudzu control much higher priority. It's more important than a new 
battleship or a new business, and it's where we live.  If this noxious, 
spreading Asian weed's blanketing of the south is not slowed or 
reversed, it will cause more harm than any number of imaginary foreign 
weapons pointed in our direction. A few billion dollars now can control 
a scourge and help us reclaim our land. If the politicians really love 
our state as they so frequently state, they should do something about 
kudzu now.