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THE PLANT THAT ATE MISSISSIPPI

© Dorothy Hill

It creeps along the ground silently waiting for the moment to attack. It can slowly strangle the life out of a tree or bush. Stand still. Watch it for a while. It looks so innocent, and the purple flowers smell so good. But be careful. When you see it move, hightail it out of there, or it just might catch a hold of you. It's the plant that ate Mississippi. It's kudzu.

Kudzu is our government's gift to the South (Ha! And you wonder why many Mississippians have such an ingrained distrust of everything Washington touches.). Back in the 1930's when times were really tough, Washington came up with the idea of encouraging Southern farmers to plant kudzu. It was supposed to be the savior of Southern soil that was worn out through poor management and too much planting of cotton. Not only would the government provide the kudzu seedlings free of charge, they would also pay the farmer to plant it. It seemed like THE answer to those poor farmers caught in the Great Depression. Little did they know what lay in wait.

Kudzu is not native to this country. It originated in Asia and was introduced as an ornamental plant to the United States by Japan in 1876. Its dense foliage was thought to be attractive and perfect for shading a porch. With no natural enemies and a warm, humid climate, kudzu quickly took root in Mississippi and in the rest of the South and grew...and grew...and grew...and grew...and grew. Soon farmers were paying folks to try to help them get rid of the kudzu.

If you want to make a neighbor mad, just let him see you planting kudzu. It is almost impossible to get rid of kudzu once it has taken root. The roots of the plant may go more than twelve feet deep. The vines can grow a foot in length a day and more than sixty feet over the course of the summer. Multiply that by lots of vines on lots of plants and you can see why kudzu is considered the plant that ate Mississippi. In Mississippi alone, kudzu covers over 250,000 acres--and that's a lot of land that could be put to better use.

So what good is it? It is good for forage (if you don't lose your cow or goat in it). Some folks are finding its vines are good for basket making and its leaves and flowers can be used in recipes. (Can you imagine sitting at the dinner table and asking someone to please pass the kudzu?) And, believe it or not, they have even discovered that there is something in the kudzu root that can reduce the craving for alcohol as much as 90%. (Of course, in Mississippi trying to keep the kudzu from taking over your yard has been known to increase the craving.) Maybe one day, we will wake up in Mississippi and discover there is gold hanging from those power lines, covering barns and abandoned houses, snaking across our yards, and creeping over roads we haven't traveled in the last thirty minutes. You never know. It could happen.

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