Texas Kudzu

For the third year in a row, most odf the Dallas area is being attacked by alien supervines. I thought my Honey Suckle was greening up nicely until I took a closer look and found these weed vines had grown through the middle and spread over the top and were killing the Honey suckle. I've tried a lot of things to kill it off but it's EVERYWHERE down here and acts just like a miniture Kudzu.The only way I've found to get rid of it is to follow it down through the other plants to the ground and then follow the root, which travel for miles and dig it up.
Anyone have any idea what it is and how to irradicate it completely from the universe?
Thanks,
Barry

I sure hope someone comes along that knows what this, because I have it as well. It started in my flowerbeds about 3 years ago, and there seems no way to get rid of it. It grows like a Jack and the Beanstalk vine overnight. I live in San Antonio, and the hotter it gets the faster it seems to grow.

This message was edited Jun 20, 2005 5:44 PM

We have that too, it flowers eventually. I forget what the nursery guy said it was though. It climbs tall trees and comes up everywhere.

Barry, The vine is called Coralbeads or Carolina Snailseed, Cocculus carolinus. I have one that keeps coming back. Pulling on the vine doesn't help since it breaks off near the soil. You will have to dig it out or untwine it from your plants and spray it with Round-up.

Hi Betty,
I'll give that a try. They're EVERYwhere around here. I've tried to follow the roots but they seem to go on for miles. So, if I understand you, I should keep the vine intact and seperate it from the plant I want to keep and spray ithe vine with roundup? Should I wrap it with plastic wrap after spraying to keep it from coming in to contact with the other plants? I'm so gun shy of using herbacides that I've started using an artist's paint brush and painting it where I need it.
Thanks!

I have this stuff too! The term I heard used was "wild morning glory" though I'm not sure if that is accurate. It was all over my backyard when we moved in. It climbs up the side of the house, pops up in the MIDDLE of beds like a clump, just goes everywhere. If you follow the skinny green visible vine down into the soil, it is attached to a woody "root" looking thing that runs horizontally. Then if you start pulling on THAT it rips across your bed, uprooting all the plants in it's path. So are we talking about the same thing?! Someone told me to take that horticulural strenght vinegar and dab it on the leaves with a paint brush or something. And that this works better when temps are mild- like 70s-90s. So after it warms up but before it gets really really hot. I HATE THIS STUFF!

The vine that I have coming up everywhere has heartshaped leaves, and when it blooms has tiny yellow flowers. The wild morning glory has smaller leaves and blooms with a little bigger pinkish lavender flowers with a darker center. I just looked at the picture above and the leaves look the same as mine, but the flowers look a lot bigger.

This message was edited Jun 22, 2005 6:36 PM

Mine doesn't flower....

Minigrannie, we have a vine here with the yellow flowers, isn't it silver lace vine? Gets silvery seedheads that sort of resemble clematis seedheads? It is everywhere, climbs over or up everything.

Barry, you don't have to wrap the vine you are spraying, but you may want to protect what you want to keep against spray drift. Once the Round-Up dries it's supposed to be safe for other plants to come into contact with it. There is a new Round-Up on the market that supposedly breaks down after it dries so there is no harmful residue outside the plant you want to eliminate. It comes in a ready to use gallon plastic can.

The only nice thing I can say about Coralbeads is that they don't have thorns. We have several different kinds of briars here. The leaves are heart shaped, larger and with the nastiest recurved thorns imaginable. One kind has mottled leaves. These things can grow straight up until they reach tree branches then they clamber all over the trees. Luckily, 90% of the vines die if cut under the surface. They can form an underground tubers and those do come back.

Texasgarden, Miniegrannie, Calalily, will you post photos of your vines?

HI Betty,
We have those vines too. When I was a kid we called them "Wait a minute" vines from what we'd say whenever we would step into them in the wooda, they'd tangle into skin, clothes or whatever. I have a few of them here and it's a nasty surprise when you're pulling the other vines. The thorny ones will go through any work glove I've used and can cut you like a cat'd claw. I hate them too but they're not as prevalent here and ,as you say, are much easier to control.

I heard it called "bind vine" recently. A fitting name. I just call it Kudzu, and I've named my place Kudzu Corners.

Seems we ought to be able to come up with a commercial use for it..... Making rope for example. Or use it to tear up old asphalt parking lots - it will grow anywhere.

Round Up works to some degree, but the roots go out so far in so many directions, that you can't really tell which vines and leaves are connect to other vines and leaves thru the root system. My understanding of Round Up type herbacides is that you have to spray it on practically all of the foliage of a plant in order to kill it. I never know if I've found all the foliage of any one Kudzu plant!

YIKES!! Could it be that there is only ONE Kudzu plant on the whole planet? That's how you may feel when you carefully dig and pull that main woody root and follow it around your garden only to discover that it dives under your concrete driveway and disappears, (presumably) to emerge on the other side, 15 feet away!

I've decided there are two things to learn when managing Kudzu:
1. Don't give up, and
2. Get used to it. You will never get rid of it all.

They make all sorts of stuff out of real Kudzu like jams and jellies, medicinal suppliments, and stuff. I don't want to be the one who tests the edibility of what we have, though...
I've seen the real stuff and, even with the problems my little vines cause, I don't envy the people who have to deal with the real thing.

I too have this *#@/!#^%# STUFF!
It is ALL in the alley behind my house and seems to pop up here and there in my yard. I'm gonna try to kill it on the fence of the property behind me 'someday'. There have been some areas in my yard where it had apparently been growing for YEARS and I learned that you have to DIG DEEP. Seems to have tubers.
The younger ones popping up are not as hard to get rid of.
A REAL nightmare!

I've had this before and you can cut the stems off at 20" then stick the ends in Round-Up. That way you don't have to worry about spraying other plants and it sucks the poison down into the tuber. It is a very effective way to get rid of poison ivy. Good luck and I hope this helps.

That sounds great!
I'll give it a try.