What is the best way to kill poison ivy?

Question

I did oatmeal bath, calamine lotion, someone told me salt, vinegar,etc. Nothin seems to work.

Answer 1

Some people are so allergic to it that it actually gets in their blood steam from smelling it!! So obviously no matter what they do it won't help them, so it depends on how bad you have it, but either way the answers the same: course of time...nothing really works, except benadryl, so tot he store and get it now and it will help.

Answer 2

I had a bad case last summer and tried everything the pharmacy had to offer - the best cure is calamine lotion - no scratching -warm showers twice a day with mild soap with a cold rinse and more calamine right away - don't reuse your bath towels - change your sheets every day - If it gets really bad you can go
to the doctor and get a prescription for a steroid but I forgot it's name - Good luck - I'm getting itchy just thinking about you

Answer 3

If there is any way you can get Fels Naptha soap - it's the best! It comes in a bar and is used for laundry. Get the soap a little wet, rub it on the rash, and let it dry without washing it off. You want to dry out the Poison Ivy as much as possible and that's what the Fels Naptha does. To relieve the itching, take a HOT shower or continue to itch -using the bar of soap.

Answer 4

Ivarest? I can't remember the name exactly, but there is a picture of a stop sign on the bottle. That worked the best for me and I used to get it bad all the time.

Answer 5

Getting Rid of the Plants
Poison ivy, oak and sumac are most dangerous in the spring and summer, when there is plenty of sap, the urushiol content is high, and the plants are easily bruised. However, the danger doesn't disappear over the winter. Dormant plants can still cause reactions, and cases have been reported in people who used the twigs of the plant for firewood or the vines for Christmas wreaths. Even dead plants can cause a reaction, because urushiol remains active for several years after the plant dies.

If poison ivy invades your yard, "there's really no good news for you," says David Yost, a horticulturist (specialist in fruits, vegetables, flowers, and general gardening) with the state of Virginia. The two herbicides most commonly used for poison ivy--Roundup and Ortho Poison Ivy Killer--will kill other plants as well. Spraying Roundup (active ingredient glyphosate) on the foliage of young plants will kill the poison ivy, but if the poison ivy vine is growing up your prize rhododendron or azalea, for example, the Roundup will kill them too, he says.

Ortho Poison Ivy Killer (active ingredient triclopyr), if used sparingly, will kill poison ivy but not trees it grows around, says Joseph Neal, Ph.D., associate professor of weed science, Cornell University. "But don't use it around shrubs, broadleaf ground cover, or herbaceous garden plants," he says. Neal explains it is possible to spray the poison ivy without killing other plants if you pull the poison ivy vines away from the desirable plants and wipe the ivy foliage with the herbicide, or use a shield on the sprayer to direct the chemical.

If you don't want to use chemicals, "manual removal will get rid of the ivy if you're diligent," says Neal. You must get every bit of the plant--leaves, vines, and roots--or it will sprout again.

The plants should be thrown away according to your municipality's regulations, says Neal. Although urushiol will break down with composting, Neal doesn't recommend that because the plants must be chopped into small pieces first, which just adds to the time you're exposed to the plant and risk of a rash. "It's a health issue," he says.

Never burn the plants. The urushiol can spread in the smoke and cause serious lung irritation.

The American Academy of Dermatology recommends that whenever you're going to be around poison ivy--trying to clear it from your yard or hiking in the woods--you wear long pants and long sleeves and, if possible, gloves and boots.

Neal recommends wearing plastic gloves over cotton gloves when pulling the plants. Plastic alone isn't enough because the plastic rips, and cotton alone won't work because after a while the urushiol will soak through.

--I.B.S.



Identification Please
Unfortunately, poison ivy, oak and sumac don't grow with little picture ID badges around their stems, so you have to know what to look for. The famous rule "leaves of three, let it be" is good to follow, except that some of the plants don't always play by the rules and have leaves in groups of five to nine. To avoid these plants and their itchy consequences, here's what to look for.

Poison Ivy
grows around lakes and streams in the Midwest and the East
woody, ropelike vine, a trailing shrub on the ground, or a free-standing shrub
normally three leaflets (groups of leaves all on the same small stem coming off the larger main stem), but may vary from groups of three to nine
leaves are green in the summer and red in the fall
yellow or green flowers and white berries
Poison Oak
eastern (from New Jersey to Texas) grows as a low shrub; western (along the Pacific coast) grows to 6-foot-tall clumps or vines up to 30 feet long
oak-like leaves, usually in clusters of three
clusters of yellow berries
Poison Sumac
grows in boggy areas, especially in the Southeast
rangy shrub up to 15 feet tall
seven to 13 smooth-edged leaflets
glossy pale yellow or cream-colored berries

Answer 6

If you have it, there's nothing to kill. You're having an allergic reaction to the sap. Try benedryl (diphenhydramine hydrochloride) for the itching, hydrocortisone for itching and to help dry it up. You can't spread it by acratching, but you can make it itch more and get infections from too much scratching.

Answer 7

there is a medicine around that isnt cheap but supposedly works great! it kills the oil that causes the irritation
it is around $20 for a tube but worth it

Answer 8

Didn't work for me either. Time is the only thing that kills it for me.