Watch Out for Poison Ivy

Poison ivy (Toxicodendron radicans) is a perennial plant that is detrimental to most humans. The entire plant is poisonous because of the oil that it exudes.

Poison ivy is one of those plants most everyone has heard about, if not suffered from miserably. Usually we think of poison ivy as a little plant in the woods or along the edge of fields. Actually, it is a vine-like plant that gets very large and long. The best way to identify poison ivy is by the three-leaflet leaf; the three leaflets may or may not have notches.

All forms of the plant have the active ingredient that causes blistering of the skin when it comes in contact with the plant. The blistering oil, known as urushiols, gets on your skin and quickly degrades or rubs off. The blisters you get are the result of this often brief encounter.

More info can be found on UConn’s Home and Garden education website, <www.canr.uconn.edu/garden>.