Houses Covered in Kudzu

Posted by Alex in Architecture, Home & Garden, Pictures, Travel & Places on April 17, 2008 at 12:33 pm



Photo: Jack Anthony

Kudzu is a climbing vine introduced into the United States from Japan in 1876 at the Philadelphia Centennial Expo as a forage crop and ornamental plan. In the early 1950s, US Department of Agriculture encouraged farmers to plant kudzu to reduce soil erosion.

Fast forward a couple of decades later, kudzu is a fast growing weed that has infested about 11,000 square miles of the southeastern United States. It costs around $500 million every year in lost cropland and control costs.

Jack Anthony has a photo gallery of abandoned houses in Georgia, Alabama, and South Carolina that have been taken over by kudzu, noting that they make "interesting natural sculptures": Link – via Cynical-C


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22 comments to "Houses Covered in Kudzu"

  1. Algonkin
    April 17th, 2008 at 12:38 pm

    Whoah!...that is awesome!

  2. TijuanaSergio
    April 17th, 2008 at 12:53 pm

    In which of these houses did Jordy Verrill used to live?

  3. MrsBug
    April 17th, 2008 at 12:55 pm

    It's also supposed to make really good animal forage. Get yourself a couple of goats and you're good to go!

  4. rhea_sun
    April 17th, 2008 at 1:04 pm

    noting? ("...that they make "interesting natural sculptures")

  5. RKelly
    April 17th, 2008 at 1:05 pm

    In Missouri the plant has been declared a noxious weed and designated to be eradicated by anyone whose property it is on. Many of the old side highways where the plant used to grow and covered the trees have had the plants removed.

  6. Lasse
    April 17th, 2008 at 1:09 pm

    I guess the japanese won the war after all. ;-)

  7. empty-minded
    April 17th, 2008 at 1:24 pm

    It seems that the biofuel available through this much kudzu could turn out to be an advantage instead of a detriment.

  8. Brian
    April 17th, 2008 at 1:48 pm

    Remember the Enchanted Land Magic card: Kudzu?

    http://www.mtgfanatic.com//images/Magic/Revised/Kudzu.jpg

  9. CheeseDuck
    April 17th, 2008 at 2:33 pm

    Its like its eating the houses.

  10. Viola
    April 17th, 2008 at 2:40 pm

    I love ivy on old houses, but only when it's a house with some ivy and not ivy with some house.

  11. * Miss UNIVERSE
    April 17th, 2008 at 2:50 pm

    Don't give us any ideas...
    Sooner of later - as a result of this article - some producer will create a thriller about KILLER KUDZOS taking over the world.

    You can almost see someone working on the script now.

    One mutant vine that is unstoppable, just strangles everything in its path

    Mutant DNA that makes it impenetrable to science.

    Actually, it is a lovely vine, once keeped in control.

    It can actually help insulate the home

  12. Jesse
    April 17th, 2008 at 3:11 pm

    I live in Gainesville, GA and Kudzu is almost engulfing our apartment complex! It is a huge concern here, the kudzu grows extremely fast and will take out anything in its path. I can see a movie from that...

  13. medussa
    April 17th, 2008 at 3:50 pm

    I've traveled through lots of kudzu country. It's a beautiful weed, if you're not the landowner. But knowing that everything underneath rots from lack of light and air makes it a little less beautiful...

  14. Alex
    April 17th, 2008 at 4:28 pm

    Yup - thanks for the fix, rhea_sun!

    Re: kudzu, I heard that it can grow about a foot a day!

  15. Miss Cellania
    April 17th, 2008 at 5:04 pm

    It can grow a yard a day, if conditions are right. This picture looks like my neighborhood in August.

  16. kid_icarus
    April 17th, 2008 at 5:45 pm

    yeah in north carolina they have kudzu eating competitions.....really beautiful to look at, but when you realize all the natural fauna underneath is being choked it becomes not so great. and it is nearly impossible to kill.

  17. Daniel Kim
    April 17th, 2008 at 9:44 pm

    Of course, every dry ton of Kudzu represents greenhouse gasses (gases?) sequestered from the atmosphere. Kudzu should be harvested and then buried in tectonic subduction zones, to be carried into the earth's core!

  18. just visiting
    April 18th, 2008 at 3:41 am

    It's edible.
    http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/Y/yawye/kudzu.html
    Instead of eradicating it with poison, use it for 'biofuel' instead of corn and wheat.

    The stupidity of humans never ceases to amaze me.

  19. Marc
    April 18th, 2008 at 7:24 am

    Yeah, if biofuel production wasn't a net waste of energy.

    The ignorance of some humans has ceased to amaze me.

  20. God
    April 18th, 2008 at 9:15 am

    Hopefully it won't be known as a weed for long. As stated in the comments above it is edible for both animals and for humans (is apparently quite tasty as a salad and smells like grape leaves), it also yields the same amount of biofuel as corn without actually impacting the food supply, and is used in Japan for natural medicines.

  21. poochner
    April 18th, 2008 at 1:08 pm

    biofuel production per se isn't a net waste of energy. Ethanol production from corn is, because they grow it with energy intensive fertilizers and don't use the whole plant. Wheat (and other grains / grasses) make efficient biofuel. You can also filter some oils (like canola) after they've been used in deep frying and use them in diesel engines (with some "retuning" I think). If you're after generic energy (heat / electricity) rather than motor fuel, you can take anything that grows fast and burns well. Bamboo biomass is good for that. The CO2 from the burn is taken up by the new plant material as it grows. Not 100% efficient, but good. Kudzu doesn't fit this too well since it takes too long to dry to a burnable state.

  22. fsmarch
    April 18th, 2008 at 5:11 pm

    The bottom line, though, is that this alien species was introduced by man into a biosphere that did not have natural defenses against it.

    History DOES repeat itself. Look at how many native species that have been driven to extinction by man's intervention.

    We never learn, do we?


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