Three leaves, no spines, can be trouble
I did something this past week I have not done in some twenty years. I got poison ivy.
Given what I do for a living, running around the wild all the time in a state smothered with poison ivy, I suppose two cases 20 years apart is a good record.
Berries range from green to white
It’s a small rash with a big itch, on the front of my right knee. Clearly I kneeled in it. That I didn’t notice is perhaps a professional embarrassment or a statement to my enthusiasm. But I really didn’t get off the beaten path so where I actually got exposed is a tad of a mystery. I’m assaulted by fire ants often, which is why I wear long white socks while teaching. They are my first line of defense against those amazingly painful creatures. And wasps are also in the occupation hazard mix. Fleet of feet helps with those, and avoiding three places where they love to nest: Folded palm fronds, and inside sculpted podocarpus or elaeagnus bushes, occasionally southern cedars as well.
When I knowingly get exposed to poison Ivy I quickly wash — within the minute — with Fels Naptha soap. That has seemed to have worked for the last two decades. Of course the key word is “knowingly….” Fels Naptha is an inexpensive industrial strength laundry soap sold by the bar in most grocery stores, costing somewhere around a dollar per. My mother used it as well. Experts say immediate washing is good, even with just water. You want to remove the offending oil urushiol (you-RUE-she-all) before it penetrates the skin. The woodlore of using Jewelweed juice on skin exposed to poison ivy might stem from the plant’s saponins, a natural soap it contains. The important point to remember is don’t use a soap with oil in it as the oil will just spread the urushiol around making things worse. You want a non-oil soap that breaks surface tension and helps wash the urushiol away, as quickly as possible. I always have my “poison ivy” soap and water with me when in the field.
Poison Ivy In Fall
There’s an amazing amount of misinformation about poison ivy on the Internet, even on medical sites that should do better. While there may indeed be three people in the seven billion of us who are absolutely immune to poison ivy, the 6,999,997 rest of us are not. Better we differ in our resistance and rate of expose. Said another way, nearly everyone will get poison ivy if they are exposed to it long enough, including the 20 percent who are really resistant. For some that is one exposure, for others dozens. The folks who say “I’m immune to poison ivy” are the prime candidates because they are not avoiding it. Over the years I have spoken to many a person who was extremely surprise when they got their first case because they were “immune.” The point is you will get poison ivy at some point if you keep getting exposed to it so the best course of action is to avoid it and keep that day as far away as possible, if ever. Dr. Kngsbury who was an expert on toxicology said the plant cells had to be breeched to release the oil, that just rubbing the plant would not cause a problem He added, however, that an insect chewing part of a leaf would release the oil so even a small amont of crushed cells and release enough oil to cause a reaction. He was adamant that soap did no good and that the contamination was immediate. Other view have disagree in the 47 years since he wrote his book saying that non-oil soaps, even plan clod water helps if used immediately.
Incidentally, there is little difference between Poison Ivy and “Poison oak.” There’s no agreement whether they one or two species. Best guess is different varities of the same species. From our point of view it doesn’t matter. It, or they, are bad. In fact there are six related species that can give people rashes or other allergic reactions: Mangoes, cashews, pistachios, poison ivy, poison sumac, and Brazilian pepper.
Poison ivy can climb and cover trees
All that said there are some interesting facts about poison ivy. Only humans and some other primates get it. Your dog and cat can’t. But they can carry the oil, urushiol on their fur and give it to you, and that oil is active for years. Poison ivy is also a very nutritious food for deer as well as rabbits. Some 60 birds eat the fruit and bees visit the blossoms.
What is fascinating is how poison ivy works. The oil “locks” onto to your skin cells, essentially interrupting the chemical signal from the skin to the rest of the body. Thus the area expose is viewed as foreign, so the body attacks it. The result is sores, itching and bleeding. As bad as that is it also has a positive side. Native Americans would put poison ivy sap on warts so the body would get rid of the warts. That’s some interesting thinking. Unfortunately poison ivy can also be systemic. You can get it on your knee and have it crop up on your back. In fact, the only other time I got poison ivy the first blisters appeared in my right elbow. Then they showed up in my left elbow then behind both knees.
What irritates me the most is not the itching but that I am so good at recognizing it that it managed to get me anyway. There is one other possibility. I’m quite sure I did not come in contact with the plant. However, it did rain and the oil can wash off with the water carrying it. I could have knelt in that, a more feasible explanation, or at least one my ego likes it.
Euell Theophilus Gibbons 1911-75
There is also a controversial side to the plant: Eating poison ivy to confer immunity. No doctor would recommend it nor do I. However, Euell Gibbons — the previous generation’s back-to-nature guy, wrote that he ate some every spring and never had a case of poison ivy after. I know an herbalist who does the same thing in the spring every year. And I personally have seen one person eat it, again in the spring. There are three theories:
One is they all eat the plant in the spring when perhaps urushiol production is low. Or, two, the mucus that covers our insides protects us and we just digest the oil. A third possibility is it does somehow confer a protection. Kingsbury was firm in his thinking that eating it was very dangerous and that the plant was dangerous all year long. I think I will leave the experimenting to others. I’m not compelled to try it, not sure why… ah pardon me a moment while I scratch my knee…
For me avoiding poison ivy has worked fairly well thus far so no sampling in spring needed though I am pondering switching to long pants, maybe a tight body suit… nawh…
{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
I just recently finished reading “Stalking the Wild Asparagus” and when I read the chapter on Poison Ivy, I was a little iffy too. As far as I know, I’ve never had a case of Poison Ivy, and I know I’ve touched it before, so my resistance seems to be high, but I also don’t plan on knowingly rolling around in it anytime soon. I also don’t think I’ll be throwing it in my salads anytime soon either.
It is a resistance thing… but opposite from building a resistance, you are actually lowering your resistance every time you are in contact with the oil. It is true, this is coming from, me, who use to laugh because my brother would get it, and I could roll in it and I wouldnt…. until… Wham… I got it all over my face!!! His resistance was lowered quicker, because he was constantly in the woods, tramping through poison ivy. But mine eventually was wore down also. So I also follow your advice, stay away if possible!!
What was the catch phrase from The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy? “Resistance is futile.” That about sums it up for poison ivy. Just stay away from it. It’s been two weeks and I’m still itching. Then again, it is proof I get out in the field and don’t just tickytype at a computer all day.
I am new to your site, and I see on another post, you have a 13 part series on something lol, but it doesn’t say what, or where to find it.
It’s now a 16-part series on edible flowers. I have uploaded two parts though they are all written.
Thanks… Winter Springs… I could walk there from here…
I have systemic Poison Ivy. Dr. said if I ate any it might kill me. Don’t think I’ll try it…
Regarding poison ivy, in the old days loggers would dose themselves with homeopathic “Rhus Tox” (poison ivy) each spring to avoid getting the rash. In my experience jewel weed is fairly useless as a preventative, according to herbal lore you are supposed to crush it and apply to cure or prevent the rash. What HAS worked for me is to go to a stream and scrub the area affected with mud right after exposure. If the rash appears then take Burdock Root (Arctium lappa) internally as capsules or tea to clear the blood, because poison ivy is systemic. Also bathe the area with a strong Sweet Fern tea (Comptonia peregrina).
Hey Green Deane,
Great new site. I am loving how it all flows together. As far as the whole poison ivy thing, I have been plagued by it for years. On a trip to south Florida to photograph a rare orchid I had to lay in a patch and I had it from chin to shin. I was told about a product called TECNU and TECNU EXTREME. It is to be used to clean before the rash like you do with the Fels but it can also be used if you have the rash because it contains a plant called Grindelia Robusta (I know nothing about it) that works as a great anti-itch. I used it in the shower morning and before bed and the rash was gone in three days. I know i sound like a commercial but prior to finding TECNU I would just scratch open the rash and pour bleach on it. I am also interested in the ink that used to be made from it if you have any sources I could study.
Thanks for writing. Great stuff to know. I’ve never heard of poison ivy being used for ink (pokeweed berries yes, and I’ve written about that) but not poison ivy. However, members of that family have been used for centuries to make lacquer. That’s what the Japanese used to get that shiny black lacquer on many delicate products. It was made from the sap, and once dry, not toxic to touch.
I’ve read that drinking goat’s milk from goat’s eating poison ivy can confer immunity. Sounds much nicer than eating yourself.
Okay…. you first…
don’t hold back on trying goats milk! Not that any immunity could be conferred, it is possible, but also that part of it might not work at all. goats milk is one of the closest things to human milk because of the way its produced by the animal and it is generally very healthy. Often people who are allergic to cow’s milk can drink goat’s milk without issue. It tastes so similar you’ll be surprised. Nothing at all wrong with it and it should be tried just to be adventurous. It of course is a great food!
What about the manchineel tree (sp?)?
Avoid the Manchineel, Hippomane mancinella.
If you’ve ever wondered what the green or red lumpy bumps are on poison ivy, they’re galls caused by a mite that makes its home in the plant’s tissue.
http://bugguide.net/node/view/214835
The lacquer you speak of was from poison ivy? maybe that was the indelible part of it and it may have been mixed with something else like pokeweed. Or it may be a case of the first person saying something that ultimately gets distorted down the line, if you know what I mean.
When the toxic oil is dry it loses its toxicity, at least to touch.
Just a followup on the comment regarding drinking milk from goats that ingest poison ivy. I dated a girl who drank milk from cows that ate poison ivy. I observed her rubbing poison ivy leaves on her arms with no apparent effect even days after the event. I don’t know if she was resistant, immune or crazy but it was weeks before I agreed to let her touch me. And she was Hot!
Since I have “systemic” poison ivy; I don’t have to touch it. I went in the woods a short distance a few days ago. I saw some small PI plants; maybe 3″ tall. I didn’t touch them. and it was cool so ho heat transfer. I got it on my hip, my thigh and lower leg… all under my clothes…..
I tried Euell Gibbons’ advice on eating poison ivy! I ate a leaf every day starting in the early spring. Sometime in June I tested my immunity by pressing a large poison ivy leaf to my arm, and got no rash (and I definitely am sensitive to it.) I stopped eating it then, supposing I’d got my immunity for the year, and later touched some and got a rash, so I suppose the immunity only lasts while you are eating it.
I tried it again the next year, but because we had very cold weather followed by very hot weather, it soon became difficult to find small enough poison ivy leaves to eat. I knew when I ate one that was a little too large, because I would get a small rash somewhere on my body that had definitely not touched poison ivy. So I gave it up, and haven’t done it since.
I have done the poison ivy immunity immunization process. The first time I ate a leaf I was very nervous as I am very allergic to it. I learned the technique from an instructor whom I trust. He has been doing the technique for 20 years. He eats one leaf per week, in the spring, gradually progressing in size, for 9 weeks. You cannot get into poisin ivy during the 9 week process or it will negate the immunization effects. It gets him about ten months of immunity, so winter months(Georgia) are risky especially since the plant has no leaves on it here. I would never condone anyone trying it…but I took the initial leap of faith and know I can eat it(not letting it touch my lips). My teacher has tested it by rubbing a leaf on his arm and only reacting with a red bump similar to a mosquito bite that went away wi to try thin an hour. Im hopeful to have the same success! I recently had steroid shot, cream and antibiotics to alleviate a bad case of poison ivy, so for me to try this was scarey..but im 5 weeks in and no negative results.
My husband is a farrier (he shoes horses). He gets very small bits of it, usually on his hands several times every spring. We have been quite certain for a very long time now that he is picking it up from the horses, since he has to pick up and work on their hooves. He never ends up with a bad case usually only one to three little bubbles.
On my end of things I never seem to have a bad reaction to it, but I have eczema. I have often said that eczema is the itchiest thing in the world and if you can learn the self control to not scratch it, well then even poison ivy isn’t that much of an issue. I find the more you scratch poison ivy the worse it becomes, perhaps because it is just one more way to irritate the skin on an already irritated place. I have also heard that if the blisters pop that liquid can spread it, I don’t think that is true, but what is your opinion or knowledge on that?
I used to say I was immune to poison oak. Two years ago in the spring, I was breaking branches on our property. I had scraped my arm and must have touched poison oak on the open skin. I had it on my inner arm where your arm bends. It blistered up, tons of puss. It was horrible! I had to sleep with my arm straight and take a shower using one hand to wash my hair. Every time I bent my arm, the blisters would break open. Disgusting. I stay far away from it now.
Nearly all the people who end up in the hospital over poison ivy/oak are folks who thought they were immune whereas what they were really doing was lowering their resistance. Then one time too many and BAM!
I spend a lot of time in the woods and never get it. I hunt, primitive camp and bushcraft so I know I get exposed but not even an itch in decades. When I was a kid in North Carolina I got it really, really bad several times. Once while skipping school, I was swinging on a vine at the local swimming hole and I got it on almost every inch of my body. Had to take baths in calamine for weeks. It was really horrible. I can’t remember ever having it since then. I have heard that people who work in factories where cashews, a related plant, are processed develop a resistance to it as well. Could a extreme exposure like mine develop your resistance to it. Seems weird but it is the only thing I can think of that would explain this.
The medical literature is full of examples like yours, folks who thought they wrer/are somehow immune. They are the ones who end up in the hospital with a severe case. As for an explanation, the current thinking is everyone is born with a resistance to poison ivy. The resistance varies individual to individual. But, each exposure reduces the resistance and at some point it will be one exposure too many and you will end up in the hospital. I have had many people tell me a story just like yours only to end it with having to go to the hospital and now are severely allergic to it. I actually have one “immune” student who now cannot virtually get anywhere near a plant, he doesn’t even have to touch it to get it… and he was immune just like you. The point is avoid poison ivy or it will catch up with you one day.