Common Name: Kudzu
Family: Leguminosae (Pea)
Genus: Pueraria
Species: Lobata
Description: This is a very prolific vine, growing to heights of sixty feet or more. The blossom is rather small, pealike, and blush purple. The compound leaves are large and divided into three rounded lobes.
Habitat: roadsides, wasteplaces
Blooms: July through September
Kudzu's introduction to the U.S. dates back to 1876. In the Japanese Pavilion at this exposition was a "wonder" plant, "pueraria lobata", or Kudzu. The Japanese used this vine as a forage plant and as food and medicine. The root was ground into fine powder, which was a prized food. The leaves too were eaten, cooked like other greens. In Japan the plant never became a pest, mainly because of the intensive land-use practices there.
Was once thought to be a godsend for eroded areas in the South.Grows on steep banks of red clay, but it also grew very quickly. It was grown commercially as a forage plant and in areas with poor soil to help enrich the soil.
For a short time it was often called "King Kudzu". as Kudzu began tp "eat" telephone poles and trees, however, people became somewhat disenchanted with this wonder plant. Eventually it was accused of being the plant that ate the south.
Kudzu can grow 80 to 100 feet during a single growing season (holy crap that's tall) and will cover just about anything. Is especially noticeable alsong highways where control measures have not been practiced.
Kudzu is no longer commercially grown, because it is difficult to harvest mechanically and too easy to overgraze. Kudzu can be used to make vine wreaths, though the finished product is not nearly as shiny or graceful as wreaths made with grape vines.
No comments:
Post a Comment