Kudzu
By the statue of the satyr where the kudzu is the thickest,
I toil pulling roots out, and I swear I am the quickest.
Every place I see the vine, I vow that I will best it.
I remove it from the soil, conquering it lest it
cover all my property from here up to the sea,
knowing if it had its way, that it would cover me!!!
Prompt words today are satyr, place, kudzu, toil, root and me.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 
yeah it sure would 🙂
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And suddenly, I realized that that huge strangling vine is Kudzu which I though didn’t reach all the way up here, but apparently, it has. They’ve got it on Martha’s Vineyard (how did it get to an island in the Atlantic ocean?), Oregon, Montana, parts of Canada and all up and down the east coast. The only think that keeps it from killing everything including us (this is the kind of plant that grows as much as a foot a day and will climb in through you window and tie you to you bed overnight) is that it needs sunlight, so it only grows at the edge of the woods. It’s too dark IN the woods.
This stuff is very scary!
ALL the invasive vines have hit us at the same time. Short of poison — and only special “kudzu poison” works on it — it’s impervious to the rest — has roots the size of boulders and it becomes more treelike, thick and woody as it grows. Swell. It is the ONLY thing that survived the drought — which somehow, figures.
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The blight of the southern U.S. I’ve never lived anywhere where it was a problem..The prompt word made me bring up the issue.
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That stuff is spreading EVERYWHERE. I didn’t realize it had arrived here. I knew it was in New York years ago, but somehow, I hoped we’d miss it. But it’s here and it’s ugly — and getting rid of it? Hah. Not happening.
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Hope you don’t have Japanese knotweed!
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We don’t have kudzu either! It was a prompt word that made me even bring up the subject.
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Are you in La Manz? I’m here for a week. Going home the 7th.
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O>M>G You write about Kudzu like you are familiar with it~! You Can’t pull it, fight it poison it, or get rid of it~! I hope you do not have it~! There are WHOLE towns in Louisiana and Mississippi that are completely covered with it~! (I MEAN COMPLETELY COVERED~!), you know, can’t see the homes, buildings, or streets~!
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Yes I know about it from reading so many southern writers
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I lived it, first hand. They decided that it would stop erosion and spread it all up and down the roads and railroads. Over night almost it covered everything. Then they said it was good for cattle, it is not, in fact it is not good for anything, almost ghostly, over night, it will completely cover a house. Like a fog, it may look pretty to a person who does not have to live with it, but it is really hard to stop~!
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I am now fighting another such invasive myself, that I accidentally got into the riparian area of my koi pond when it was attached next to a bog plant that I did know. It is called “horse tail reed grass”, and is just a little stick like stem looking like bamboo, sticking up but it quickly multiplies and spreads everywhere and is about two feet tall and thick as grass, covering all the other plants… This is not the one by a similar name as the succulent in pot plants, “Sedum morganianum”, it is NOT a succulent, if it was I could have controlled it~!
https://www.gardeningchannel.com/how-to-grow-or-eradicate-horsetail-plant/
I have removed the koi from the pond so I can try to get rid of it, and I am in the process of letting it all dry out.. I need to get rid of dead leaves in the pond anyway. I will then try to dig this crap out a stem at the time and poison any roots with a systemic herbicide. . I hope that will get rid of it. It is said to be difficult~!
My lesson~!!!!! Be careful that you know what is growing on your place. A simple thing such as what they called a “golden rain tree” , “tree of heaven”, was started in Houston because it turned yellow and red in the fall and Yankees wanted to see the fall colors… Well they got it because a nursery pushed these trees and they are everywhere. When you fly over, that is all you see.. The birds eat the seeds and sew them everywhere… Very difficult to stop as they shade out the good plants. A single tree is pretty but when they “take over and push out other plants they become a pest~! A simple plant like a china-berry tree is almost as bad~! and people have them all over. Birds eat the seeds and spread them all over. I am told that in Arizona people moving from the north made the same mistake planting the things that they knew “back home”, where the winter frost could control them.
Salt Cedar, “depression weed” was on my place when I first bought it, Slowly I have gotten rid of it. Then I noticed that a neighbor had one growing near me and so got permission to kill it too..
http://texastreeid.tamu.edu/content/aggressiveInvaders/
We must be very careful with plants that we are not sure of.
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Yes, I have the horsetail, which I planted and like. Pasiano will cut it way back and the last time he did it never grew back after 20 years. I think the hot water overflow from the pool killed it. I have just a small patch in a contained area in front.
I also have the golden shower tree which might be the same as your golden rain. I published a blog about it years ago and again a few days ago. It is the one that got me tangled up with Donald Trump in the news….
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