As a native Midwesterner, I had no idea what kudzu was until I took a fishing trip to Florida while attending college, and lived in Georgia for two years. I am now well aware of kudzu and feel that we all need to have a greater appreciation of kudzu patches. You cannot simply remove or kill kudzu. Kudzu patches can be very large, in close quarters with the public, or in areas that are inaccessible to spray equipment. They are also very resilient and are not susceptible to herbicides like Roundup®. So, kudzu is not like a patch of Canadian thistle. You can’t simply go out back and hit it with Roundup® or another herbicide.
Two kudzu patches that escaped killing frosts in southern Georgia were found to be infected with rust and were subsequently destroyed, but in these cases, the vast majority of the vines were already dead. Despite these reports, we are going to have to deal with kudzu being a host for soybean rust for years to come. – Daren Mueller
