What horrible stuff.... We make sure we have a bar of homemade lye soap or Fels Naptha to wash and/or shower with if we think we've been exposed. I also keep a tube of tecnu Extreme - medicated poison ivy scrub. Both my husband and daughter have scars from encounters with poison ivy.

As a former cemetery sexton, there is probably little, or nothing, in the cemetery budget to purchase spray to eradicate the poison ivy. If you feel generous, you might want to donate the spray (or money for the spray) to the cemetery board. I'm sure they would appreciate it. The small country cemetery I worked for also had a problem with it.

-Grainlady

Yes. Cape Cod is covered in it. I got a bad case of poison oak 2.5 years ago, which got badly infected, and the stress on my immune system from fighting both of those things caused my knees to blow up, and I couldn't walk for two years. I was on crutches 24/7 for one full year. From my knees down, my legs were useless. Recovered at a glacial pace. Knees only returned to 100% last December, so two years. Some remnant joint pain in my left ankle, but I'm finally able to live normally, walk for fitness again, regaining strength in my legs...it was unbelievable.

In the laundry section of your grocery store, get a bar of Fels-Naptha soap. If you think you're going to be going near poison ivy, wash your skin with the Fels-Naptha before you go. You won't be affected if you rub up against the poison ivy. If you think you've been in poison ivy, wash yourself with the Fels-Naptha when you get home. Also wash any clothes with the Fels-Naptha you think might have the poison oil on them. I got poison ivy on my face three weeks ago because I'd been weeding, but it was hot and I kept wiping my face with my shirt. Ended up with the stuff all over the right side of my face. I felt like someone had beaten me. But at least that didn't get infected!

I keep a bar of Fels Naptha soap alongside my kitchen sink, but I didn't know about using it before exposure to poison ivy. What an ordeal you went through, Tibbrix! Many of us might consider Cape Cod to be idyllic, but--as I taught my children--it's true that everything is a tradeoff.

I hadn't thought about cemetery budgets, Grainlady. Unfortunately, as widow whose husband spent several years in a nursing home, I can't afford to be generous and donate to local cemeteries. However, I might bring a spray bottle with me on occasion, provided Roundup won't damage old gravestones.

I have eagle eyes for it, so although it is quite common in our yard and our area, I have only rarely got it, since I see it and avoid it. As well as systematically trying to eradicate it.

It is nasty stuff. We live in a woods and if we see it starting to vine up a tree, we hack it into as vines will kill trees. I have had poison ivy but not in years. Yes, wash well if you think you have been in the smoke from burning it or touched it.

Sue

I despise it, too. I remember one year I even got it in February! I ran into the root system, though the above-ground part was dead. I do keep Caladryl to hand, but I'm happy to learn about other alternatives.

As a child I was the one who got the poison ivy everywhere. So bad that I had to go to a doctor. I used everything on it. From a cloth dipped in Clorox to calamine lotion and other remedies I'm sure I have forgotten. I also had poison oak too. I learned to know what to look for and stay out of the woods. Today if I am working in our yard I wear long sleeves and gloves on my hands. Haven't had it in years. I feel your pain..

I don't have a terrible reaction--none to brushing against the leaves, and I often pull seedlings with my thumb and forefinger. If I break a stem or root and get the sap on my skin, I'll break out.

I read last year that if you think you've been exposed, wash with COLD water and something abrasive (the Technu is good). Hot water opens the pores, which allows them to absorb more of the urushiol, which causes a more severe histamine reaction.

This year I had it from grabbing a handful that was camouflaged by some weeds I was pulling--I had no idea until I broke out, and later found the vine sprouting new leaves. The birds drop seeds every year, resulting in new seedlings in the flower beds.

I have an eagle eye for it, too--I brag that I can spot it at 200 paces, which is probably an exaggeration LOL. So if it get it on my skin it's usually a tiny smear on my arm where I encountered it while weeding. But even that is enough to keep me awake with itching unless I keep treating it.

Artemis, the worst case of PI I ever had was when I was on my knees digging with a trowel into soil where the roots of dead vines resided. I didn't realize that as my trowel pierced the roots, oil sprayed into my face. Fortunately, I wore glasses at the time. But my chin area took a bad hit. I woke up the next morning with vertigo and the rash.

Bob, I just saw your pictures. I don't think I was the one who expressed skepticism, but that is one nasty vine! I like the toad, though. :-)

alisande, you need to be careful and maybe a bit less adventuresome, there are too many things you encounter regularly that threaten your health. My mental picture of the outdoor environment you've described over time is one that presents one danger after another.

Maybe I'm just too much of a city slicker?

Maybe I'm just too much of a city slicker?

Um . . . yes. :-)

But that's okay; I used to be like that myself (a long time ago).

In this thread:

http://ths.gardenweb.com/discussions/3151550/doing-battle-with-vine-and-weeds

you wrote:

I'm trying to envision poison ivy vines the size of your arm, and I've decided you have skinny arms. :-)

So perhaps not skepticism, but I remembered you wrote something like that and wanted to get a picture of one of the monster vines.

We had one pine tree in our pasture that from a distance looked like a deciduous tree. There was an entire canopy of poison ivy branches and leaves, nearly as large as the spread of the pine tree.

I'm so clever (even if my memory isn't so hot). LOL

I've gotten it twice this year. The first time I thought I was being careful around it but I wasn't. The next time I got it right above my gloves. I've been using Brush B Gone to kill it.

I live in an ocean of poison ivy, but (knock on wood), I have never had a bad reaction to it. Have a huge vine like Bob posted, growing up a tree near the house. (Nice toad, by the way). It grows on the ground by my front gate (the one by the road). I don't bother it.....we have an "uneasy truce". However, I had a friend who had never broke out from poison ivy, but then one day he did, and after that, he got it every time he was anywhere around it. One of the reasons I don't bother it, I attended a lecture one time on native plants for birds and the lecturer said one of the most important food sources for birds was poison ivy. I'm not kidding....that is what he said. Since I am a "little" anti social, and I do like birds....I don't bother the poison ivy. Same reason I don't bother wasp nests.....I am not allergic to their stings and it never occurs to me to kill them. However, I was taking my new horse, Bane, to the vet recently, and he is a little hard to load in a trailer, and after I got him in, I saw a big nest of red wasps on the front wall of the trailer...just above his rump, since he had turned and was facing out. He is a nervous horse to begin with, so I had some ant spray and I spritzed them carefully and as they fell to the floor stepped on them. I knew that wasp nest was in there but had forgotten about it, since they don't bother me....but I couldn't risk them stinging him.

And if you think you stepped on/in any, be sure to wash your shoes, also! A few years ago, DSIL kept getting it. She couldn't get rid of it. We were visiting when this came up. I asked her if she had washed her clothes right after she got in it. Yes. So then I asked if she had also washed her sneakers, as I know she keeps an old pair just for yard work. No...... didn't think of that. So she washed her sneakers also, and finally quit getting it. She would no sooner get one side cleared up, then would get it all over her other side. So even though she thought she was being careful, and washing her clothes after contact, she was still spreading the oil that was left on her shoes.

Dad used to pour straight ammonia on his. Yuck. His brother used the Fels-Naptha. A friend used straight bleach. Yuck ouch!

My mommy told me, "Leaves of three, leave it be."

I got into some last fall when I was clearing out some night shade. There was bit of poison ivy mixed in with it and I did not notice.

I get into it so much, I have learned to immediately wash with a stripping kind of soap three times, rinsing well in between each lather, then wipe down with rubbing alcohol. Even it's begun that puffy, itchy red stuff, it's gone. How much do I have to put up with it? I taught my son at a very very early age, not only leaves of three let it be, but would occasionally test him. Is this poison ivy? No? Why not? Leaves of five, right. It's Virginia Creeper. He learned to spot it pretty quickly and would come find me if his baseball or other bouncy ball landed in it. I pulled and pulled as much as I could at our last house, until I went to visit the neighbors and finally realized it was coming from their infested yard. Ugh.

Btw, don't ever burn poison anything or even anything that might have come into contact with it. People inhale the smoke. So dangerous as it has the poison stuff in it.

Just today I noticed I have a small spot of it on one ankle. Likely it is either from a potluck picnic this past weekend where I saw a few small plants of poison ivy in the mowed area where the food tables were setup, or perhaps from my walk around the yard looking for pictures of large hairy vines.

If the latter, it's all my fault. :-)

I have poison ivy radar, too, because I've had it a few times in my life. Have you all read that poison ivy is getting more prevalent and has more urushiol because of the warming climate? Nice. I try to avoid pesticides unless absolutely necessary, but glyphosate or something comparable (agent orange?) is absolutely necessary in the case of poison ivy.

A helpful hint to distinguish poison ivy from box elder seedlings is that the elder leaves are opposite on the main stem, but the poison ivy leaves are alternate on the vine.

Interesting fact: mangoes also have some urushiol in the leaves and rind. I can eat a mango, prepare a mango, hold a mango with no ill effects. But one time I ate the fruit right off the skin, and I ended up with a rash on my lips. Years later I read about the mango-urushiol connection.

Cashews are also in the same plant family. I love cashews, but if I eat too many, I have an intestinal reaction. I've read that workers in third-world cashew production often have painful skin reactions because the nuts have to be hand-shelled, to keep the kernels intact.

I knew mangos were in the same plant family, but did not know that about cashews!

I used to get it really really bad, but not so much anymore. I am MUCH more vigilant now.

Here's my worst poison ivy story. Somehow I got it on my thigh. Itching, burning, etc. Kept getting worse and spreading. This was in the day of pantihose. On Monday I had to go to work, so I went ahead and put my pantihose on. Won't be that bad, I thought. During the day it itched and itched and itched. The light rubbing from the pantihose abraded it and it blistered. Every time I went to the bathroom that day I thought, "hmmm . . . maybe this wasn't such a good idea." Late in the day on my last trip to the bathroom, I discovered that the blisters had burst and partially dried into the pantihose. O.M.G. I had to literally pull my skin off as I pulled the pantihose down. Then it was a raw, oozing mess. I stayed home the next day and went to the doctor for a shot. And Prednisone tablets.

No wonder you're vigilant now, Littlebug!

I had a terrible case of it this summer after helping to clean out a small historic cemetery here in Levittown. My whole arm was covered with it. I had to go to the doctor and take prednisone for 10 days! Even then the rash lasted another two weeks. I am usually pretty vigilant and don't know how it slipped by me but it did to my regret.

Joann

That sounds so unpleasant, Joann! One little plant can cause so much misery.