Poison ivy -- a plant everyone should know

 

I’ve led dozen of nature hikes through the years and on each and every one of them one of the questions posed to me has been: “What does poison ivy look like?”

You’d be surprised by how many people are unfamiliar with the plant, especially given that it is so bothersome and has sent many a person to the doctor or ER. To me, it should be one of those dangers you educate your kids about at an early age – like crossing the road and talking to strangers.

So, here’s a primer about poison ivy...

Where to find it

Poison ivy grows best in direct sun, so it can be found in waste areas (the edges of parking lots, roads, railroad corridors), thickets, open woods, orchards and lawns. Young forests without a major canopy can be especially riddled with it.

Sadly, poison ivy is one of the more abundant plants in Niagara County’s woodlands. In many spots, it can blanket forest floors and hiking trails, which is why I always tell hikers to wear pants, not shorts, in Niagara’s wilds.

Compare that to Allegany County where it is less common, perhaps due to soil type, maybe elevation. In many forests at slightly higher elevations (say, 2,000 feet-plus) you’ll have a hard time finding it at all.

Appearance

Poison ivy grows in two ways.

It can be a ground-based plant. A perennial, it will take root and come back the next year. These adult plants can then send runners, where their root system expands and more plants pop out in the adjacent area, hence the really dense growth that can occur.

Poison ivy will also climb up trees and create some pretty impressive vines. Whereas wild grapes might have a shaggy-barked vine that is freely hanging from limbs, poison ivy holds tight to trunks and numerous small but strong hairs, almost like stems, emanate from the whole length of the vine and grab onto the trunk like fingers.

Poison ivy has three leaflets, each two- to four-inches long with the middle one having a slightly longer stalk than the outer two. The plants are green and will remain so till late-September or early-October when they start to turn red like other forest dwellers (some folks wrongly believe that poison ivy can be told by red-green leaves all year).

The leaves can be slightly variable in shape...some can be smooth-edged, some can have a few teeth or deep lobes. Pretty vague description, eh?

What I always tell folks to do is notice the edges of the leaves. On many ivy plants, one or all three leaflets will have one, two, or a few large teeth on the outside edge. That’s in stark contrast to other three-leaved plants that have many more teeth and look serrated (like wild strawberry). Once you see that, you know its poison ivy and you can look at the neighboring ivy plants in that colony to understand their slight variations.

Before killing what you think is poison ivy, be sure to really familiarize yourself with it. It should not be confused with other three-leafed plants (like jack in the pulpit and trillium) or other vines (like the five- or six-leafed Virginia creeper).

What it does

Poison ivy has an oil within it called urushiol which is released when the stems, vines, or leaves are broken or bruised.

Eighty to 90 percent of people are susceptible to urushiol and it causes an allergic reaction — more properly known as contact dermatitis -- which presents itself as a rash with hard bumps or blisters, usually within 2 or 3 days of the initial contact.

Each person develops the symptoms differently. Some will rarely break out and may have only one itchy bump, while others may experience numerous bothersome boils.

That’s bad enough, but some folks are even more sensitive: my gym teacher in elementary school missed work for quite a while as he had been burning brush and the sooty smoke caused urushiol aggravation in his throat and lungs! How do you scratch that itch?

It should be noted that if you get bumps the day of contact with a variety of plants when you are doing gardening or ranch work, that rash is more likely caused by the hairs of stinging nettles, which present themselves almost immediately. Poison ivy takes a little time.

First aid

The old adage “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” really rings true with poison ivy. An even better one to follow until you’ve mastered plant identification is “leaves of three, let it be.”

If doing trail work or collecting firewood, wear gloves. If you’ve come in contact with poison ivy, immediately wash your hands to get the oil off. You must use soap and water and, if you are really allergic to ivy, use rubbing alcohol. A natural and reliable remedy is to use juices from jewelweed (touch-me-not).

If you haven’t washed well enough or didn’t know you touched poison ivy and have gotten blisters, apply wet compresses, calamine lotion, or hydrocortisone cream to the skin to reduce itching. You can also take an antihistamine such as diphenhydramine (Benadryl) to relieve the stress. Some swear by oatmeal baths. Many people develop so powerful of a reaction they have to seek medical attention and take a steroid prescription.

Despite urban legends to the contrary, poison ivy blisters are not contagious. You will not get a rash from someone else’s rash, you will only get it from the plants and oils themselves.

Hopefully, you are not among those who really get socked by poison ivy. If you are or may be genetically predisposed to be so, take the time to familiarize with poison ivy. If you take a few minutes to do a Google image search of the plant, you can become really familiar with its appearance and maximize your enjoyment of the outdoors.