Environmentally friendly kudzu eradication

In Tennessee, Goats Eat the ‘Vine That Ate the South’

National
In Tennessee, Goats Eat the ‘Vine That Ate the South’
By THEO EMERY
Published: June 5, 2007
Chattanooga’s goats have become the city’s weapon against kudzu, the fast-growing vine that throttles the Southern landscape.

Excerpt:

Kudzu, which is native to Asia, was introduced in the United States in 1876 at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, according to the United States Forest Service. It arrived in the South several years later, becoming a popular ornamental vine, then a forage and erosion-control crop. In the Great Depression, the federal government paid farmers to plant it.

First called “the miracle vine,” kudzu eventually came to be known as “the vine that ate the South.” It grows at an astonishing rate of a foot a day, smothering flora, swallowing houses and blanketing the landscape.


Grazing Goats May Provide Solution To Widespread Kudzu Problem Here

Wiki Kudzu

Comment: Kudzu makes me glad I live in the frigid North where it does not grow - yet?! Good pictures of Kudzu in the Wiki article.