WALNUT HILL, Fla. - "Cogon grass, a fast-growing Asian weed that initially hitchhiked to America as a packing material, is becoming a worse plant scourge than the infamous kudzu vine in many parts of the South. It kills pine seedlings, is a hot-burning fire hazard, squeezes out native plants and ruins habitats for threatened species such as the gopher tortoise and indigo snake. Cogon is even more aggressive and harder to get rid of than the ubiquitous kudzu.
"There's no pest, disease or fungus that destroys it," said Ross Price, manager of a 45,000-acre pine plantation for La Floresta Perdida Inc. "We can retard it, slow it and stop it, but the word 'control' I don't have."
Spraying, burning and uprooting have eliminated kudzu from woodlands that Price oversees in the northwest tip of the Florida Panhandle, but cogon remains a growing problem here and elsewhere. "Kudzu's a weenie plant compared to cogon grass," said James H. Miller, research ecologist for the U.S. Forest Service in Auburn, Ala.
Cogon is considered one of the world's 10 worst weeds and has invaded every continent except Antarctica. In the United States, it has spread as far south as the Everglades, up into South Carolina and west into Texas, but Florida is the epicenter, Miller said. Cogon has invaded 30 of Florida's 67 counties."
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