Is my poison ivy dying??

[TOM KAN PA]

My poison ivy is getting a wart-like growth on the leaves, and they are curling up. Is this a disease that will kill the ivy?? "Geez, I hope not," he sez tongue in cheek.

[Phisherman]

No. If you want to eliminate the ivy use 2,4D or RoundUp, and reapply after 3 weeks if needed. Fortunately, I have a friend who is non-allergic to pull out the poison ivy and dispose of it.

[Stephen M. Henning]

No. Most poison-ivy spray is roundup applied at twice the normal strength. If the poison ivy is climbing up trees, cut off the top so that you can spray all the leaves on the part that is left. Be sure to get it before the berries form and the birds eat them and plant many more plants.

[simy1]

No. My PI gets that stuff occasionally, specially those that are vining in full sun, and always recovers. A small paintbrush dipped in straight Roundup, touching one leaf, that is the way to deal with it.

[Frogleg]

What are you doing sitting around watching it instead of trying to eradicate it? Even if you're not sensitive to it, the corossive (and I speak from experience) oil in the leaves can be transfered on animal fur and clothing. Not to mention the plant spreading and seeding to bring misery to others. It isn't 'cute' to have a pet poison ivy plant.

[Frogleg]

I understood the tongue/cheek reference. I deduced from the original post that you were observing it carefully and not doing much to get rid of it. Wear disposable gloves, clip it at ground level, paint the stems with full-strength RoundUp, and dispose of the the residue as responsibly as possible. Do *not* burn, as the smoke is lethal (I looked it up -- although the most common definition of lethal is "deadly", a secondary (thirdary?) one is "extremely harmful.")

*Don't* just sit and stare at it. :-)

[TOM KAN PA]

____Reply Separator_____ I prefer Brush-B-Gon.

[dkat]

lighten up. It is easy to miss read postings (anyone here able to claim that "THEY" have never done so!?).

Viruses cause this type of bumping. The plants have their own type of immune system and manage it quite well. It is not going to eliminate your problem (though if I were not highly allergic to poison ivy I could be tempted - mind you tempted to not consider it a problem.... It is one of the most beautiful fall plants in coloring)...

I know you didn't ask but I want to put in my 2 cents for others who are reading this thread and who may not know about it that TECNU is a great product that you can use to remove the tar like substance that poison ivy puts on your skin and which most people are allergic to. DON'T use it as a soap! It can be very expensive if you use it that way and potentially just spread the tar to other parts of your body. Instead use it as the solvent it is and how you would use something to take off tar from your skin. Take a small amount, rub it on the area that you believe to have touch poison ivy (or if you are beginning to show the rash, where the rash is). Rub for at least a couple of minutes or for as long as you can tolerate it. Then take a paper towel or a rag you can throw away and wipe off the Tecnu and hopefully most of the poison ivy tar. You will have to do this any time you feel any itching or signs of the effects of the poison ivy. I am HIGHLY allergic to poison ivy and react very badly to it. This treatment will take what was 3 weeks of pure hell for me down to a couple of days of annoyance. And I know that I'm not just adapting out to the poison ivy because every once in awhile I become complacent and let it go thinking poison ivy is no big deal now and I really pay for it.

DK

P.S. I imagine that any solvent that works on road/roofing/etc. tar would work on the poison ivy tar. Tecnu is the only commercial product that I know of for this purpose though and I buy it to support them since they have made living on the east coast livable for me.