{"id":601,"date":"2011-07-02T14:30:00","date_gmt":"2011-07-02T14:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/07\/road-trip-2011-thoughts-on-kudzu.html"},"modified":"2011-07-02T14:30:00","modified_gmt":"2011-07-02T14:30:00","slug":"road-trip-2011-thoughts-on-kudzu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/07\/road-trip-2011-thoughts-on-kudzu.html","title":{"rendered":"Road Trip 2011: Thoughts on Kudzu"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
This is what much of my drive up I-59 and I-81 looked like last month.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

If you’re unfamiliar with the southeastern U.S., you might have never seen this.  Having lived in North Carolina for 3 years, there were areas where we came to expect it.<\/p>\n

So…what is kudzu?  You can read the details, from the taxonomy to the history, on Wikipedia<\/a>.  To summarize, kudzu is an Asian-native vine that was introduced to the United States in the late 1800s and was encouraged as a soil-erosion control near interstate highways.  Today, the vine is significantly invasive, covering complete mountainsides throughout the Appalachians.<\/p>\n

I saw it all over the place on our drive up I-59 and I-81…and it was disturbingly fascinating seeing it in its prime after living in non-kudzu-infested Nebraska for 2 1\/2 years.  The vines allegedly can grow one FOOT per day…and there are even legends of folks hearing the vine as it grows!  It covers hillsides, meadows, trees, buildings, power poles and even electrical lines like an enormous plush green blanket.<\/p>\n

Kudzu is indeed edible, and on Alton Brown’s 2006 television special Feasting on Asphalt<\/a>, Brown stopped in Cashiers, NC and demonstrated how you can cut the youngest leaves for salad.  Kudzu is also used to make jelly, soaps and lotions.  The Asians have claimed kudzu’s medicinal benefits.<\/p>\n

There’s been recent research about letting cattle graze on kudzu, both as an attempt to control the plant, but also for the benefit of the cattle, since it would be cheap, nutritious feed.  Others have come up with ways to profit from kudzu.<\/a><\/p>\n

This biking blogger offers some more history and perspective on the weed.<\/a>  In particular like the map he cites showing the kudzu growth areas in the U.S.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is what much of my drive up I-59 and I-81 looked like last month. If you’re unfamiliar with the southeastern U.S., you might have never seen this.  Having lived in North Carolina for 3 years, there were areas where we came to expect it. So…what is kudzu?  You can read the details, from the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[],"tags":[620,616,163,37,38],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5ycQ0-9H","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":534,"url":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/03\/florida-discoveries-5-mass-wisteria.html","url_meta":{"origin":601,"position":0},"title":"Florida Discoveries 5: Mass Wisteria!","date":"23 March 11","format":false,"excerpt":"It's a 12.3 mile drive on U.S. 98 between our neighborhood in Navarre, and Dave's base to our east. 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\u00a0All the techno-gadgetry is a Geek\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"geek\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/-iARmbjYqZv8\/TjiglSuwiHI\/AAAAAAABYsw\/uUwGZ-TxQrE\/s640\/IMG_5379.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":595,"url":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/06\/road-trip-2011-wordless-wednesday-edition.html","url_meta":{"origin":601,"position":2},"title":"Road Trip 2011: Wordless Wednesday Edition","date":"29 June 11","format":false,"excerpt":"I've never done a \"Wordless Wednesday\" before, but I thought we'd have a good time with these pictures Dave and I took of Amtrak's 40th Anniversary exhibit train\u00a0at the Strasburg Railroad in June, pulled by a P40 locomotive. \u00a0Considering these to decorate Jacob's room, since he's a fan of Amtrak.","rel":"","context":"In \"railfanning\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/2.bp.blogspot.com\/-B8WYlfHxMnc\/Tgx1SkI519I\/AAAAAAABXJY\/LOPRheT49BY\/s400\/IMG_8641.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":600,"url":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/07\/road-trip-2011-a-test-and-a-cute-picture.html","url_meta":{"origin":601,"position":3},"title":"Road Trip 2011: A Test and a Cute Picture","date":"02 July 11","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a test to see if my e-mail customers are getting my posts. \u00a0Meanwhile enjoy this picture of the boys shoveling coal at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania:","rel":"","context":"In \"blogging\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/3.bp.blogspot.com\/-3Ca5oeorzog\/Tgx4Uw4Z6BI\/AAAAAAABXN4\/gzaa4fcaH68\/s640\/IMG_8717.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":594,"url":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/06\/road-trip-2011-the-numbers-are-in.html","url_meta":{"origin":601,"position":4},"title":"Road Trip 2011: The Numbers Are In…","date":"29 June 11","format":false,"excerpt":"We had our truck about 14 months before learning about the \"Average Fuel\" setting that ties to the trip odometer.Yep...that's the total number of miles driven on our two-week road trip in the lower right. \u00a0And, as an added bonus, we have the average mileage. \u00a0That'll come in handy for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"geek\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lh4.googleusercontent.com\/-AxwvKogZvro\/TgvoVdlPFAI\/AAAAAAABW-k\/ziqdtoemNxE\/s640\/IMG_5231.JPG?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":597,"url":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/2011\/07\/road-trip-2011-a-few-hours-at-penn-state.html","url_meta":{"origin":601,"position":5},"title":"Road Trip 2011: A Few Hours at Penn State….","date":"01 July 11","format":false,"excerpt":"We had an invitation up to visit a famous (in N-scale model railroading circles) basement model railroad in Lewistown, PA, while we were in Hershey for the N-Scale Convention. \u00a0I asked if we could \"swing by\" Penn State at least for lunch and some souvenir shopping. \u00a0Lewistown is about 1\/2\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"penn state\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-O7GYRzdNoNc\/ThPcDsP0cVI\/AAAAAAABXpE\/GTdfMFbbvOg\/s640\/J%2526T_NittanyLion.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevollmerfamily.com\/MajorMom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}