My hobby of eradicating poison ivy in bond park.

When we first moved here you could not walk down the path in the spring without poison ivy brushing against you.  With a dog and frequent walks we were often suffering from poison ivy rashes and over time my wife’s reactions got worse.   Each rash started spreading with steroids eventually required to fight off the rash anywhere and everywhere.

Despite being common land i started with spraying during quiet times, trying to keep it off the path.  Every few weeks more spraying was required.  The next year i had to spray the path but also i tried to spray as far as the spray would reach with me still on the path.  Looking beyond was a vision of poison ivy hell – thick poison ivy over every thing.

In general i have not suffered from the poison ivy eradication because i always wear covering clothing and wash it immediately without the clothes touching the floor, going right into the washer, and me taking a shower with lots of soap.  If i brushed against any while out i would go home immediately and wash, sometime using lake water if i was too far away from the house.

The next year i tried to make a path along the lake, spraying to open up a path, turning around when it got thick and returning a few weeks later to spray again and make the path a little longer. Over several weeks with very careful walking through the minefield of semi dead poison ivy growth to reach new areas the 2 paths could be walked without imminent contagion.  Washing clothes and showering were mandatory to avoid spreading the poison

After making a path spraying the next year i started to isolate patches working from the top of the lake near the dam down towards the end of the lake.  The closest area of suffocating poison ivy infection was actually up the lake, so i wanted to test whether you could eradicate a well established infestation.

I should digress to some of the poison ivy terminology i use:

Class 3 or arboreal Armageddon

An area of at least 50 yards

Trees killed by poison ivy in the center

Hell on earth for a hiker

Nature run amok and rendering the earth uninhabitable

Class 2 or infestation or toxic wasteland

Infestation of at least 10 vines within 20 yards

Class 1 or old vines

In mature forests with large trees poison ivy vines can grow up high, this is often manageable itself with little human contact, however its seeds spread new growth all over the park.

All you see are the furry vines

Persistent roots

Bird droppings, root spread

First growth of seeds, bushy plants,

Invaders from the roots

How to eradicate each type of infestation

Class 1 or old vines

3 or more years may be required

First spray early when the poison ivy is the only green out.   Poison ivy like many invasive plants try to sprout early to get more growth than competing plants so if you time it right in the spring it is easy to spray and just get poison ivy and no other plants.  I walk a lot through the woods so i could monitor for the right spraying conditions.

I try to buy multiple brands of the poison organic and non organic that are the most specific to poison ivy.  I do not like using bad chemicals so i tried to get the formulas most specific to poison ivy thinking it was less harmful to other plants.

Wait 3 weeks or so and go back to respray getting as high up the vine as you can. 

Wait a few weeks to see if more root sprouts occur.  Once the roots stop sending out any growth from the root then cut the vine.  Put undiluted poison on the roots down and leave a few inches out of the vine otherwise it will close back up.

The roots will now try putting up growth, sometimes even with different shapes, often called by different names but from the same poisonous roots.  You have to commit to up to 3 years or more of followup.  You will have to return each spring for a few years and spray any sprouting 3 leaf poison ivy.  The roots are persistent but you can kill them in the end.  It may not seem like it when in the first few years they try multiple times and every few weeks when you walk through you see new growth. 

The key to reducing time and effort for eradication is the get every bit of growth related to a vine all at the same time and good heavy dose.  Then return as the vine roots send up sprouting plants.  Keep spraying the vine root sprouts until you see that the poison ivy flowers are about to be ripe.  You do not them ripe but fully grown and maturing.  Basically the most sugar up in the vine as possible.  Then cut the vine and spray a different type of poison un-diluted directly on the vine.  Follow up diligently with respray of any growth from the  cut roots.  Spray when freshly growing but not mature.

Eventually as it first worked for me up the lake towards the dam – it took around 5 years for a class 2 infestation.  It felt so good to go down to the lake there and have a look around without having to worry about poison ivy contamination.  It gave me the courage to continue down the lake.

My class 3 eradication project

Down the lark towards the swamping areas were some isolated vines, but in two places were infestations where the vines had suffocated the trees and were marching on.

I sprayed around the edges for 2 years, spraying and returning to spray further in a number of times until by mid-summer i could walk almost through the area.  I say almost due to the requirement to bath within 20 to 30 minutes of walking including laundering the clothes and isolating the shoes.

I made a number of mistakes, i cut some vines too early, at times my spray mis fired, but in general i did not suffer from poison ivy rashes more than once a year.

After working on spraying through the summer and thinking i was making progress, to see the growth return with a vengeance the next spring can be disheartening.  But persist, because you can remove it.

For next year i have made a catalog of vines still in the park.  Some are in areas i had not targeted before and others were found in the class 3 eradication hearts.  I did not find them earlier because while walking Ellie our Dalmatian would get tired of pushing through undergrowth and because this last year we had unusual flooding that cleared out undergrowth making all ares more accessible.  Large debris washed through the area leaving under the trees walkable.

Not for the faint of heart

My friends kept saying it was useless and seeing poison ivy return year after year was discouraging, but i persisted.

When you walk through the woods now their are berry, ivy, growing happily where the poison ivy used to grow.