4 days later

I got into the poison ivy about 4 days ago, and it's at it's worst right now. I got a really good case on my right arm and right hand including in between my fingers, so I can't really grip any tools right now and have essentially stopped all work. Also, due to the amount of claritin I've been taking, I'm drowsy and wouldn't want to try to do anything involving tools anyway.

It normally runs it's course in a week to 10 days, so I should start to see an improvement any day now. Thankfully, the weather's better, but I was able to get hot water out of the hose and wash it down yesterday. I also read somewhere that you can use a hair dryer on it to relieve the itching for a few hours. I don't have a hair dryer, but do have a heat gun, so I used that, and it worked really well. I guess it makes the itching so bad that the nerves get overloaded and give up. It's a real mixture of agony and ecstasy.

Zoe watch:

Thankfully, dogs can't get it, so Zoe's doing fine. I took her for a long walk this morning down to the bank, and along the way, tried to spot the poison ivy plants. I think I've finally figured it out and found a lot more than I expected.

The most turned out to be along the fence at the local park. I saw one tree growing close to the fence that looked a little suspicious, so I took a closer look. A few of the leaves looked like poison ivy, but I wasn't sure, however, I did see several large hairy vines growing up the trunk of the tree. From the bottom of the tree, all I could see were the large green leaves, but as I stepped back and looked up, I could see that these stopped at about 30-40' and the fir tree continued for another 20. I could also clearly see several of the classic poison ivy 3 leaf pattern.

The key to this pattern is that the two base leaves grow out of the stem at the same point, and the center leaf has a much longer stem. They can have notches in the leaves, but will never be serrated, and may or may not be shinny and/or red in color -- search the web to find a better description along with photos if you're interested.

This poison ivy vine had basically taken over the fir tree, but the most amazing thing about it was that it was in a park, with the grass around it neatly trimmed. Several of the vines at the base of the tree were as big around as my wrist. Up until now, I'd never have expected to find poison ivy like this. I'd always imagined it would be along the ground, maybe a few feet high, but this was around 40' high.

I'm sure I'll be fine in a few days, so all in all, it's not necessarily a bad thing, especially if I'll be able to spot it in the future. Which is a good thing, since it looks like it's getting much more prolific as well as potent. I read an article about it recently (New York Times, I think) and apparently, higher CO2 levels benefit poison ivy much more than other species, so look out.