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X🔥︎ DO NOT BURN 🔥︎X. Avoid all contact with smoke. If contact with smoke, seek ⚕ medical attention with all due speed.
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X✋︎ DO NOT TOUCH ✋︎X.
To avoid skin rash and irritation urushiol-induced contact dermatitis, avoid contact with all parts of this plant with your skin, shoes, clothing and pets:
- If contact with skin, quickly remove the oily-feeling urushiol with alcohol and a rag, or with soap and water. I read that after 10 minutes, most of the agent has been absorbed into the skin — so if you notice contact, try to remove within this time.
- If contact with shoes or clothing, wash them. For fabric, use normal laundry (some sources say in hot water; this author finds warm water adequate). For leather and suede, we have no idea (this author finds re-contact from boots and gloves minor).
- If contact with pets, we have no idea.
- If contact with tools, I try to avoid touching the blade until it has gone through soil or non-Toxicodendron wood a few times.
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Prevention and Treatment, from MSU
👥︎ People differ in their reaction to this plant — some are immune, some react strongly, and most are in the middle:
- On contact with the skin of susceptible individuals, a rash appears in a few hours to a day or two.
- Without treatment, it clears up in a week or two.
- With treatment, it clears up in 7 to 14 days.
- This author finds minor contact ignorable. But If the urge to itch is strong, a commercial pink lotion with diphenhydramine offers adequate relief for a few hours — use and repeat as directed by the label.
- One time, when this author had unseen contact with
X✋︎ Pacific poison oak Toxicodendron diversilobum ✋︎X
on the job, covering 100% of both arms, with patches on trunk caused by urushiol moved during a post-work shower, I did seek ⚕ medical attention.
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Not an ivy (genus Hedera).
Native to North America outside of California and southeastern 🇺🇸 USA.
Uses by native peoples
(Ethnobotany database)
Genus used as host by caterpillars of 5 species
of 🦋 butterflies and moths, in some areas.
Many 🐦︎ birds eat and love 🍒︎ poison ivy berries, and can be an important part of their diet. Other 🐢︎🐇︎🐜︎🐛︎ animals eat the plant itself.
For humans, however, all parts of this plant are harmful, due to an oily-feeling group of chemicals called urushiol (see chart above).
Thus, this author removes poison ivy only from footpaths, and back one big step. More than one big step into the forest or bush, I leave alone, unless causing trouble somehow.
Control Practices
At the end of the growing season, leaves turn bright red before most other deciduous plants.