Homestead Super Plant Showcase – All About Amazing Vetiver Grass
If you haven’t heard of vetiver grass and are homesteading in USDA zone 7b or higher, this is a must listen!
Vetiver Grass – Chrysopogon zizanioides – is a perennail, tufted, clump-forming grass that grows up to 9′ tall in the tropics, and typically 6′ tall in Mediterranean and humid temperate climates. It is known worldwide for its incredibly dense and fibrous root system that grows 15’+ deep, and is utilized around the world for erosion repair and prevention, slope stabilization, water clarification, sewage effluent treatment, biomass, livestock fodder, hay, and essential oil. Vetiver grass is also incredibly well-behaved – it does not produce viable seed and does not have running rhizomatous roots or stolons – meaning it will stay where you put it. To make more you can very easily divide a mature vetiver clumpe to produce upwards of 30 viable vetiver tillers (young vetiver plants budding off the mature clump).
Vetiver grass can survive winter temperatures as low as 0-5 degrees Fahrenheit, and highs up to 130 degrees Fahrenheit. It can handle snow and frost as long as the ground doesn’t freeze – which generally means it will grow and survive well in USDA Zones 7b and higher. Vetiver grass is incredibly drought hardy once established due to its incredibly deep root system and its C4 physiology. Vetiver grass culms are very stiff and upright, and when planted in contour strips, the grass will grow into a dense living wall that prevents sheetflow erosion and enhances infiltration. It can be buried in sediment and will root into accumulated sediments. It can be burned to the ground and will regrow from subterranean buds. It can be grazed heavily and is an excellent forage or cut fodder for horses, cows, sheep, goats, pigs, rabbits – even certain types of herbivorous fish! It can be cut multiple times a year and it literally a “carbon pump”. It is used throughout the world to treat sewage effluent and to clarify manure lagoons, while producing mineral rich hay as a by-product. If you have a greywater reed bed or blackwater treatment system vetiver grass is amazing and reducing total dissolved solids (TDS) and E. coli counts.
Join me in this show as we dive deep into all of the amazing characteristics and many functions that vetiver grass can perform for your homestead. This plant is incredible and is a true ally for any regenerative landscape. It is a total honey badger – incredibly tenacious once established and well-behaved in any landscape – this one can do so much for your homestead, especially if you have erosion issues or are looking to produce feed for your livestock at low to no cost!
Show Resources
- Vetiver.org – international consortium of vetiver systems practitioners – this website has an immense library of scientific literature detailing the many applications of vetiver grass for a wide range of environmental restoration purposes. All freely available.
- Vetiver grass suppliers – look up a place near you to get some vetiver slips.
- Honey Badger Nursery will be carrying vetiver grass in the near future in southeast Tennessee.
- All Things Vetiver Grass – curated YouTube playlist – lots of great videos in here demonstrating vetiver grass in a wide variety of applications – from stabilizing beaches to treating sewage effluent to holding fragile hillslopes to feeding animals.
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Music by Alex Grohl
