Too big to fail
English Ivy
Submitted 7 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/7fcc6354-dc30-465a-9799-51875e070d68.jpeg
Comments
ace_garp@lemmy.world 7 months ago
RecluseRamble@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 months ago
Oddly satisfying
cmgvd3lw@discuss.tchncs.de 7 months ago
It’s like wallpaper, but peelable.
Flocklesscrow@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Mrs. Doubtfire voice “Hellooo!”
j4k3@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Kudzu was the last bioweapons unit of the Union army in the US civil war. It never surrendered, it is still fighting the American South, and winning the guerilla war.
Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
I wish it luck on the south.
-Californian
Tlaloc_Temporal@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
Reminds me of tumbleweeds, which may as well be a Soviet bioweapon.
oxideseven@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
I’ll leave this here, as I’m particularly bothered by the weird megamyth of kudzu in the US, as is evidenced but the other comments.
English ivy is actually a generally bigger threat but it never gets any real attention.
I will concede that the image above is kudzu tho.
boogetyboo@aussie.zone 7 months ago
Playing whack a mole with my neighbours ivy. Keeps popping up on my side of the fence. Fuck whoever brought it to Australia.
MelodiousFunk@slrpnk.net 7 months ago
I’m playing whack a mole with my own ivy. Fuck the prior house owners for letting it get out of hand. I got all of it from the trees and the side of the house but it always grows back. I’m still finding sprouts from thick woody vines that have been there forever apparently. I tried removing it from the fence but realized very quickly that it’s the only thing holding it together. 😒
And fuck the English for bringing it over (we both know it was them, even their plants are colonizers).
sevan@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
Same. I have a fence that’s barely still standing now that I removed the ivy. I’ve been pulling it and spraying it for several years now. I know I’ll never win, but I’m doing my best to keep it in check. The most painful part is when I go to garden centers and see it for sale. It makes me want to cry.
ShellMonkey@lemmy.socdojo.com 7 months ago
Some of those are absurdly strong. I have wild grapes in my yard that go ahold of an old clothesline with 6 lines across it. Now I didn’t use said line so figured just let it be to feed the birds and such. Turns out it got thick enough that one winter when a particularly heavy snow came through the weight of the snow on the vine mat was enough to bend in the poles that are a good 3 inches thick.
QuantumStorm@lemmy.world 7 months ago
What I don’t get is why we don’t eat kudzu.
JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world 7 months ago
IIRC a lot of it has at some point been sprayed with super toxic herbicide to try and kill it off.
Don’t quote me on that though I’m just quoting a Wendigoon video from memory
Egg_Egg@lemm.ee 7 months ago
It’s difficult to eat your way through an invasive species. Himalayan Balsam is also edible but it’s thriving in the UK.
In fact edibility is often the reason these things are so invasive, it’s why American Signal crayfish are over in the UK.
_stranger_@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Texas: Hold my beer.
Rubisco@slrpnk.net 7 months ago
Because Crake is saving it for some special project at Rejoov.
QuantumStorm@lemmy.world 7 months ago
I hate (and am terrified) that I understood this reference. That series is horrifying.
MeatPilot@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Kudzu CONSUME
casmael@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Nah it’s pretty intent on covering the whole of England too tbh. Good for the bees in September tho ☺️
Egg_Egg@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Near rivers it has to contend with Himalayan Balsam, and the bees love that stuff too.
casmael@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Yeah I quite like the ol’ Himalayan balsam to be honest - very popular with the bumble bees. Gets a bad rap in the uk because it’s supposedly ‘invasive’, but I take rather a dim view of that kind of talk to be sure.
Hello_Kitty_enjoyer@hexbear.net 7 months ago
[deleted]propter_hog@hexbear.net 7 months ago
Was thinking the same thing; I’ve never seen English ivy take over an area like this
Hello_Kitty_enjoyer@hexbear.net 7 months ago
english taking credit for an asian achievement
everthing’s was as expected
YeetPics@mander.xyz 7 months ago
Kudzu is Chinese arrowroot tho?
flora_explora@beehaw.org 7 months ago
Apart from what others commented on these being two entirely different species, there might be other factors at play as well.
Lianas and vines are pretty common and very diverse, especially in tropical forests. They are usually found as part of the upper canopy and if there is a tree fall, they manage to fill this gap pretty quickly. The trees grow more slowly, but will manage to establish themselves eventually, filling up that gap. But if you cut down an entire forest, trees have a much harder time to establish themselves because the whole ground is just covered in these fast growing lianas or vines. There are studies that look at exactly that, how lianas inhibit forest regrowth.
So, how overgrown with lianas or vines a certain habitat is, is very much dependent on the disturbance of this habitat.
angrystego@lemmy.world 7 months ago
TankieTanuki@hexbear.net 7 months ago
Is the climate that different?
pisstoria@hexbear.net 7 months ago
It doesn’t have the same pests and diseases as in Europe to keep it in check.
Iron_Lynx@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Maybe it’s just me, but the second one in my brain gets voiced by LazerPig to the backing of Rule Britannia
TheAlbatross@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 months ago
I think the vines in the second photo are kudzu tho
Death_Equity@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Kudzu is some wild stuff, one vine tendril grows a foot a day and it kills entire forests.
Etterra@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Maybe we could start rolling it up into balls and burying it for carbon sequestering. I mean it’s just an incredible nuisance otherwise.
Alexstarfire@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Definitely. OP is clueless.
Voyajer@lemmy.world 7 months ago
English Ivy happily spreads too and will also smother natives.
fossilesque@mander.xyz 7 months ago
thatspartofthejoke.jpg
TheAlbatross@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 months ago
English ivy may grow better in Kentucky soil than Kent chaulk, but I’m not familiar with that in the way I am kudzu.
stupidcasey@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Oh in that case Kakugo shiro
Image