Having grown up in Atlanta and the South, I’ve lived with Kudzu all my life (“From 1935 to the early 1950s, farmers in the South were encouraged to plant kudzu to reduce soil erosion, and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps planted it widely for many years. Kudzu was recognized as a pest weed by the United States Department of Agriculture in 1953, and was removed from its list of permissible cover plants.” More, also, here). But this solution is a new one to me – very innovative.

When Peachtree City learned killing kudzu with chemicals and manpower might cost $387,000 a year, officials considered farming the job out ó to goats.

“They’re tearing the stuff up,” said Mayor Steve Brown, who did Internet research on kudzu-gobbling animals.

City Council members joked about it at a recent retreat, then weighed the cost of goats against conventional cutting and spraying.

“All of a sudden the goats started looking pretty good,” Brown said

It isn’t a radical solution, as I thought. Apparently, in 1989, “a University of Georgia agronomist suggested siccing 200,000 goats on the state’s thousands of kudzu-covered acres.” And NC State has used goats for two years. Tallahassee has cleared 800 acres in six years with the use of goat-like sheep.

Also check out – The 29th Annual Bltyhewood Kudzu Festival Kudzu Leaf Eating Contest