Is this kudzu?

[Cakemeister]

Hello,

I was doing a little post-Ike cleanup and I saw this plant. In the attached picture, it's growing around the grill, but I had already cleaned it out around that bush. It seems like the vines of this plant were growing around the leaves and stuff of the plant.

So is this stuff the dreaded kudzu? What should I do with it?

Regards,
CM

[ChadTower]

If it is, you can nuke it from orbit.  It's the only way to be sure.

[Benevolance]

According to wikipedia, you could cook it:

The non-woody parts of the plant are edible. The young leaves can be used for salad or cooked as a leaf vegetable, the flowers battered and fried (like squash flowers), and the starchy tuberous roots can be prepared as any root vegetable.

[ChadTower]

Oh, yeah, there are tons of uses for it.  Some parts are edible - the leaves make a good salad and the roots are nice starch.  The problem is that if he doesn't obliterate it, and it is kudzu, it won't be long before it takes over his yard.  This stuff grows a foot a day in the summer and returns if you even leave a small part of a single root in the soil.

[Benevolance]

A foot a day? Wow. He'd better learn to make big salads.

[Samstag]

Send me some kudzu.  My salad bills are outrageous!

[Ummon]

Isn't that a Middle Eastern plant?

[Benevolance]

If you're thinking what I think you're thinking, I doubt he'll be successful getting the plant deported on illegal immigration charges.

[Cakemeister]

I looked up some pictures of kudzu and I don't think what I have is kudzu.

I am no botanist, however.

[protokatie]

This stuff grows a foot a day in the summer and returns if you even leave a small part of a single root in the soil.

Hmm, now I know what to do to anyone who pisses me off. Plant a bunch of that stuff in between the paving stones of their walkway, and throw handfuls of seeds on their yard. 

[facesmiths]

This stuff grows a foot a day in the summer and returns if you even leave a small part of a single root in the soil.

Hmm, now I know what to do to anyone who pisses me off. Plant a bunch of that stuff in between the paving stones of their walkway, and throw handfuls of seeds on their yard.  Evil

actually that is what a few people I know here were planning to do to the malls here.

[ChadTower]

Isn't that a Middle Eastern plant?

It was imported into the southeastern US a few decades ago for use in erosion control.  Sadly, they didn't anticipate the complete lack of control factors and the fact that that area is at near perfect kudzu growing conditions year round.  It is now known as "the weed that ate the south".