If You Swallow Poison Ivy Then You Wont Get It Again

From the Field

Poison Ivy: Busting six Myths to Avert the Itch

When my son was in form schoolhouse, he begged to plant a vegetable garden. I thought information technology was a great thought; it would go him outdoors and get his hands in the dirt. I diligently tilled a patch of our lawn. We planted tomatoes, lettuce, string beans and dark-green peppers. In that location was only ane trouble: my kid was a carnivore and apace lost interest in our homegrown vegetarian fare.

The next summer, the weeds were chest loftier, so we turned the garden dorsum to grass. In the process, I discovered stringy vine-similar roots, which I yanked out with the balance of the tangled mess.

"I promise you were wearing a long-sleeved shirt," said my husband when I mentioned the roots. "That might exist toxicant ivy."

"In our lawn?" I replied doubtfully. "I'm non allergic to it anyway."

A week afterwards, itchy, oozing blisters erupted all over my arms, torso and neck. The plant'south roots, which had laid dormant under our lawn, beaten back past the mower, had given me my first instance of "urushiol-induced contact dermatitis".

Until the rash disappeared, I was the family pariah. No one wanted to go near me for fear of contracting my malady. They needn't take worried. I would only have been contagious if I had failed to shower subsequently my anti-gardening exploits. (The blisters contain simply water.)

How you get the rash without touching the establish is only one misconception about this toxic plant. At that place are more:

Myth #i: Poison ivy and its cousins, poison oak and poisonous substance sumac, are the only toxicant plants in the United States that cause an itchy rash.

Mangoes in a farmer'southward market. By Snapdragon66 [CC By-SA four.0] from Wikimedia Commons

Poison ivy grows in every state except for Alaska and Hawaii, but yous tin can withal get a similar rash in Hawaii if you rub mango skins confronting your body. You can also get blisters on your lips if you lot eat the sugariness fruit direct off the rind.

Poisonous substance ivy and mangoes vest to the Anacardiaceae family. Other plants in this family, such as cashews, also produce a rash-inducing oil. All cashew nuts are shelled and cooked before they arrive at the grocery store, which neutralizes their rash-inducing toxin. Unfortunately, the urushiol oil in poison ivy is resistant to estrus.

Interestingly, pistachios, another member of the Anacardiaceae family, doesn't cause a rash.
Myth #2: Animals naturally avert poison ivy because they sense it's toxic to bear upon.

Poisonous substance ivy berries. Photograph © Lisa Ballard

Both mule deer and whitetail deer, who are primarily browsers, seek leafy plants, including toxicant ivy. According to the Due south Carolina Department of Natural Resources, birds, including catbirds, chickadees and wild turkeys, sup poison ivy's smooth, white berries, especially during the winter when food is scarcer. Black bears, wood rats, raccoons and muskrats also eat the plant's stems and leaves, and toads hide under it.

Animals may not react to poison ivy, merely they can give it to humans. This toxic weed flourishes in open woodlands, especially alongside openings, like footpaths, where information technology can become sunshine yet not get crushed by hiking boots. If you go hiking with your dog and he romps through a patch of poison ivy, then you pet your dog, your easily pick up the urushiol oil. Until y'all wash them, any blank skin on your body that you impact tin get the rash, and any article of clothing or gear can transfer the itchy toxin to another role of your body or to someone else.
Myth #3: If yous don't see three leaves, it's not poison ivy.

Virginia creeper vine. Photo © Lisa Ballard

While the mantra, "leaves of iii, permit information technology exist", helps place poison ivy, which has three toothed, center- or almond-shaped leaves growing from one point on a stalk, every part of the institute tin can cause a reaction, including the stems, berries and roots every bit I inadvertently discovered.

When poisonous substance ivy first comes up in the spring, it looks dark crimson and glossy. The leaves quickly turn the same green as other leaves in a deciduous forest, simply if you look closely, there may be tinges of cerise where the leaves come together. Then, in the fall, they put on a showy display of reds and yellows on par with any maple tree.

This tenacious plant can grow as a stand up-lone perennial, shrub, ground encompass or vine. As a vine, it sprouts thousands of chocolate-brown hairs that grasp the bawl of its host tree. As it climbs toward the canopy and matures, its stalk gets woodier and increases in diameter, upwards to several inches thick, as if a second tree has grown upwardly hugging the original one.

People often confuse Virginia creeper with poison ivy, but Virginia creeper has five leaves, non three. You don't desire to bathe in Virginia creeper either. Its sap can also cause an annoying rash.
Myth #iv: I'm not allergic to poison ivy.

Poison ivy. Photo © Lisa Ballard

Don't kid yourself. Co-ordinate to the American Academy of Dermatology, about 50 million people get the rash each year, making information technology one of the about-mutual allergies in the United states of america.

If yous don't go it the first time you touch it, yous will probably get information technology the 2nd time. Unfortunately, the body doesn't build immunity. On the contrary, the more than times you are exposed to it, the worse the break out. The rash may announced in only a couple of hours on veteran poison ivy sufferers. Among first-timers, it tin take upwards to 10 days.

Urushiol oil binds to the skin in 20 minutes or less, and it'southward concentrated stuff. Only one nanogram can trigger the rash. (The boilerplate human exposure is around 100 nanograms.) But there's promise! If you lot know you've touched poison ivy and yous immediately wash the exposed area with soap and h2o, your odds of getting the rash profoundly subtract.

If you think a large expanse of your trunk may have touched information technology, take a shower, not a bath. The oil can rising to the top of your bathwater and get on more of your body. If you're in the backcountry, rinse the area in moving water. Don't forget to launder your apparel and gear, too.
Myth #5: When poison ivy dies, it can't cause the rash.

Toxicant ivy vine on window. Photo © Lisa Ballard

Urushiol oil is durable stuff. While the plant won't produce more than of it after it dies, the oil can linger for five or more years. You'll need a quick trip to the emergency room if you lot unwittingly burn information technology in a pile of dead woods, inhaling the smoke, which can carry urushiol oil into your lungs. This nasty toxin tin can also become airborne from wildfires and lawnmowers.
Myth #6: Climate change has no bear upon on poison ivy.

Toxicant ivy. Photograph © Lisa Ballard

Historically, backcountry travelers believed they were safety from poison ivy at elevations above 2,500 feet in the Due east and 4,000 anxiety in the Westward, and in desert climates. Even so, I live at 5,500 anxiety in the Beartooth Mountains near Yellowstone National Park and see it when I hike. I've also seen it in the barren Thousand Canyon afterward a rare, heavy rain tempest acquired dormant poison ivy to sally on sandbars.

Poison ivy is creeping higher and drier, but mayhap more unsettling is the fact that it's getting more stiff. According to a 2006 study published past the U.S. Department of Agronomics in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, poison ivy leaves are increasing in size and are coated with more and stronger urushiol oil as levels of carbon dioxide increase globally.

I don't mean to be an alarmist, simply more than observant. Whether doing chiliad piece of work, jogging down a land lane or trekking in the mountains, y'all can bet I'll be checking the flora before blithely blundering through it.