It's Kudzu: the scourge of the South.
Kudzu smothers everything in its path under a solid blanket of leaves. It girdles tree trunks and breaks tree branches, or sometimes uproots entire trees through the sheer force of its weight.
Kudzu plants grow rapidly and may extend 32-100 feet in length, with stems ½-4 inches in diameter. The roots are fleshy, with tap roots 7 inches thick, 6 feet long, and weighing more than 400 pounds. Thirty vines may grow from a single root crown.
Kudzu was first introduced into the U.S. in 1876 at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition as an ornamental. Farmers in the south were initially encouraged to plant kudzu to reduce soil erosion, but by 1953 it was outlawed as a permissable ground cover.
Millions of acres throughout the southern United States are covered by Kudzu, with Tennessee particularly infested. In the video at right, a newsman relates the story of Kudzu.
