India, Oct. 10 -- Take a drive through the South in midsummer, and you may see trees, utility poles, and abandoned buildings engulfed in green. Although the landscape can look as if nature has run wild, the vine was deliberately introduced and widely planted. The Alabama Cooperative Extension System traces the federal campaign to 1933, when Congress established the Soil Erosion Service to address erosion caused by farming practices. About 85 million kudzu plants were distributed to Southern landowners.

The Civilian Conservation Corps also helped plant kudzu, while the government offered farmers incentives of up to $8 per acre. By 1946, about 3 million acres of farmland had been planted with the vine, according to the Alabama Cooperative ...