Unfortunately, there isn't an herbicide that is specific just to kudzu! The control of this awful plant takes some work and some timing....and probably some Roundup! If you know where the crown of the plant is and can cut it back to the ground, you will be well on your way to overcoming it.

As the new growth emerges (like as soon as you turn your back) from the cut stump, you can paint or spray with Roundup to kill it back. Keep doing that and you WILL kill the plant.

Kudzu can best be controlled with a combination of cutting it down and spraying. If you try to paint the growth without cutting it back first, all you will do is kill off a few leaves.

Of course, there is at least one totally organic solution to your problem! See the attached link!

Here is a link that might be useful:

I would cut it back as much as I could, and then after hurricane season, when we really dry out, you can cut the ends off of your kudzu, and get some of those vials for keeping water around individual cut flowers. Fill it with "kudzu weed control" type brush killer, and let the kudzu drink it up. Do it again.
If you can then dig back to where the kudzu upper roots are and hack at the root, then put the killer into the root. KEEP WORKING AT IT. I have been battling kudzu for 7 years solid. This year is the first year it's appeared in our own yard and it is very frustrating. Our neighbours do not keep it in check.
I also use the same vial treatment in the winter as long as kudzu stems are green and the weather dry. Kudzu loves lots of water, and will drink down liquids through it's stems in dry weather.

GOOD LUCK!

GGG

I knew there was a reason I need a goat! Do they eat English ivy too? (If anyone says yes, I really might get one- zoning laws be darned! :)

Oh, LOL! :) I have 2 aunts in Alabama who have both offered me use of their goats to "mow" my lawn. I would seriously consider it except I'm sure the neighbors would report me for having livestock within the city limits.
We've lived here for 28 years and this blasted plant has always been a problem! But I swear, this has got to be one of the worst years yet. I don't know if it's all the rain or that we cut down a lot of pines or a combination of the 2. My lawn mower is giving me fits. It starts fine, but then sputters and dies. I think it must have gotten water into it during the storms. :( So right now, my yard looks like this...
{{gwi:830138}}
There's a fence under there somewhere!

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Ah, there's the gate...it goes to the backyard, which I can't even get to to take photos for fear of stepping on something slithery. It reminds me of the castle in Sleeping Beauty when the briars over-grow it. LOL!

For a few days, we didn't drive one of the vehicles parked in the driveway in front of that fence that y'all can't see and the kudzu wrapped around the wheels and the grill under the hood. Grrr!
So, now you see why I was asking for the spray. There's a precious rose bed in the backyard that I fear will be strangled before I can get the lawn mower fixed. :(

agrose,if you have 2-4-D,mix strong and either spray or paint on some leaves or stalks.i've killed elephant ears with it.

Is that safe to use around pets, wildlife, children, and plants that I want to keep?

No, it's not. It's nasty stuff and best used selectively because 2,4-d knows not what it kills. If that was my yard, I would start now, head in there with a machete and not come out until all that stuff was in a garbage bag. They may have to send out a search party for me but that much kudzu would bother me immensely. What a waste of chlorophyll!

Hire some day laborers to take a crack at an inital attempt to take it down. Over the winter and during next spring, try to locate and destroy the crowns and then stay on top of it! This is a case of "give it an inch, it will take a mile".

I agree, it does look very bad. Remember, if you make enough noise, those snakes will run out ahead of you!

Timing affects your success with killing this back as well. If you hit it hard in late August -- when it has exhausted its energy store and is waning in daily growth -- by cutting it back and spraying with roundup, you'll have better success.

You have to keep at it, though. one or two missed stolons/runners and here it comes again next year.

next year, just don't let it get that far ahead of you. It may take a daily patrol of your property with a spray gun or a bucket and brush, but, it time, you will get rid of the horrid stuff on your Property. Then, all you have to do is watch out for neighbor-creep.
PB

Hi y'all,
Thanks for all the advice! I appreciate it. I've been fighting this on-going battle for the past 28 years and it's never gotten this bad before because we've utilized a lot of the methods y'all have mentioned. I was just hoping someone knew of a spray that would help me out this year since it has gotten this bad. It wasn't neglect, just circumstances conspiring against us. :) Too much water too often, health problems, malfunctioning lawn equipment, etc.
I did some online research and found about this natural method that's being developed at GA Tech & I've heard about one at UGA, too. So, until these are made available to the public, I will go get the lawn mower repaired and break out the machete once I can actually walk in the yard again. :)
Thanks again everyone. :)

Here is a link that might be useful: better Kudzu Killer

Trees Atlanta has been experimenting with some sort of kudzu control on an empty lot in our neighbourhood. Whatever they did did not work at all except to kill back some of the top vegetation.

GGG

I can't get over those photographs you sent us! I am SO sorry! I know that it can take over in what seems like over night! Believe me, you don't have to make any kind of excuses to us!

Having seen those images, I am rethinking the goat situation I suggested. An infestation of your magnitude requires something a whole lot more powerful than a few goats!

We're on our way, and will be there in a couple of days!

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:830137}}

Stephen King may not know about it yet..."The Day Kudzu Took Over The World"..."The Creeping Kudzu"
I'm not bothered with Kudzu...Wisteria is what I'm battling...it chokes trees and causes cracks in the driveway...a beautiful vine/tree that can turn evil.
The photos of the Kudzu brought back some good memories from childhood...It covered trees and ditches...gave us kids a good shade...made a great 'tent' and a place to hide...ha

aqrose...I'm so sorry. I have nightmares about japanese beetles cause they are attacking my two trees, so I can't imagine having that kind of battle with kudzu.

I went on vacation this week and I couldn't believe all the kudzu covering the forests along the highways. It seems really bad this year.

The only way I've ever been able to kill it is to dig it out. The tubers are large and deep, and it's not easy. Repeatedly mowing over it for decades might kill it. My neighbor bragged about how he had gotten rid of his kudzu in his perfectly manicured lawn. He decided to switch types of grass, sprayed the lawn with weedkiller, and then tilled it under. Two weeks later, there was his kudzu, healthy as could be after more than five years of manic mowing. Even spraying it repeatedly with undiluted Roundup concetrate didn't kill it.

Here's the truly fabulous part: In Georgia, Kudzu is illegal and you can be fined if the one guy who patrols such things sees kudzu on your property.

What?! It's illegal? Oh, lordy, it must be one of those uninforced laws. How can a wild plant be illegal? And if it's illegal, why don't they do something to control it?

I feel your pain. Goats sound like a great idea.

Yes, it's a largely unenforced law. Last time I read anything about it, there were only one or two people on kuzdu for the whole state. Why don't they control it? Because they don't know how.

Goats like the leaves. Pigs love the tubers and will actually dig them up.

Please elaborate on the GEORGIA LAW concerning KUDZU.
For years, I've been fighting the 'creep over and under' of kudzu from a neighboring lot. This has involved pulling vines from trees, digging roots and spraying, spraying, spraying the leaves w/ brush killer.
I'm getting older and it is becoming more difficult for me physically and financially to continue this battle alone. I'd like to 'encourage' my neighboring property owner to take responsibility for this pestilence. Any court costs would have to be less than the money I've spent and will have to spend on brush sprays and chiropratic adjustments! LOL :->
Many thanks for any advice you'd care to offer concerning the discovery of the Ga.law regarding kudzu!
Nita Roberts

i was thinking of the kudzu thing, and how i found some plants in our woods i didn't recognize and how everyone freaked out when i mentioned i would of loved some seeds of it, well then, i thought about how the fear rose in me when these vines were allllllll over in these woods, it was freaky!! well it isn't your kudzu. i would of kept it in the gh as not to spread it. but i do understand now. but i am here under another point, i looked up how to kill it.
i found this link, don't know if it will help any of you.

Here is a link that might be useful: how to kill kudzu in a few hours without harming other plants,

My wife and I take the little starts and pull them and their roots out of the yard. Where it had been very large and overgrowing our fence I took a heavy duty pruner to them and cut them at the base then worked them off the fence.

Don't know how often they will grow back but for now the Kudzu in our yard is being killed above ground much faster than it's growing because I'm waging violent war on any of it above ground.

Helium!