And motorists still end up in hospital, after trying to outrace a tumbleweed on a windy day. But the tumbleweed has a lot going for it. In a dry region it makes wood more efficiently than any other plant. But it's no good as fuel, because it burns too fast with its many small branches. Scientists at Utah State University have found that it even improves the soil.
Tumbleweed trickles chemicals into the soil.
These chemicals then make the nutrients in the soil more available to other plants. Once tumbleweed has grown in the soil, other plants grow better the next season. But best of all, it's a survivor. In southern Nevada, where many nuclear weapons were tested above ground, the tumbleweed was always the first plant to start growing at Ground Zero. Like the cockroach and the frog, the tumbleweed will inherit the earth.