Squirt, don't scratch: Getting rid of poison ivy in yard, public pathways latest project

Clarion Ledger
May 28, 2008

Is poison ivy a vigorous native vine with beautiful fall colors, or a poisonous invasive thug?

How about both? It does have incredible autumn color, like red and yellow flames licking their way up tree trunks. But it spreads like crazy with underground stems, and causes me to have such severe dermatitis that I sometimes have to have cortisone shots for relief.

About the only valid landscape use I can think of for poison ivy would be along a back fence as a deterrent to kids cutting through the yard, or to help make it easier to pick burglars out of police lineups ("Yes, officer, he's the one - the one scratching all those blisters ...").

By the way, poison ivy leaves have three separate leaflets, unlike the perfectly harmless, five-leaflet Virginia creeper vine.

It took me awhile, but I have finally gotten rid of all the poison ivy in our yard. I used the herbicide called Roundup (active ingredient: glyphosate, also sold under other brand names). The trick, for those of you who have tried and failed, is to mix it exactly according to directions, no stronger, then spray it only on the new foliage of poison ivy a day or two after a good rain. The better the vine is growing, the better Roundup works.

If the vine is large, cut it down and wait for the new growth to come out of the stump, then spray that. This works. As long as you don't get it on the leaves of nearby plants it won't hurt the good plants.

Anyway, as Terryl and I walk our dogs around the neighborhood, we take note of where all the poison ivy is, to keep our dogs from rubbing through it and later transmitting the poisonous oil to us - or the couch.

Call me a vigilante, but I have decided to take it upon myself to walk around with a squirt bottle of Roundup to get rid of whatever I can reach that is along public paths. I think it's in the public's interest.

Speaking of which, at Jackson's City Hall, draping the shrubs along the sidewalk surrounding Josh Halbert Gardens, is a huge poison ivy vine, just waiting for people to brush by. I posted a photo of it (and a closeup of the vine's leaves), at the "Felderphoto of the Week" link on my Web site.

Just looking at it will make you start scratching.

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