North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Bill Russell" <shaman@pennswoods.net>]

I'm one of those person who, as a small child, ate poison ivy leaves. Nearly
all the kids around where I lived did it behind our parents' backs. A tiny
piece was all we ate. I have never had a problem with it and can weed it out
manually, bare handed. A cousin of mine did not eat the leaves and was
subject to ivy poisoning through his life.

However, I can not recommend that anyone eat the leaves to develop immuity.
I have no idea if it is true, but where I come from the folks believe that
you must be a child when you eat the leaves to not be injured by the act,
and that adults would be harmed or even killed if they tried it.

After bare hand weeding, it's difficult to remove all the toxin from your
skin. Several hot water washings with a strong detergent can do it.
Otherwise, everything you touch can carry the poison and injure others.

Anyone care to do some research??

Bill

----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Olenio" <tolenio@sentex.net>
To: <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 02, 2002 4:26 PM
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Poison ivy & immunity


> Lucky Pittman wrote:
>
> > At 11:09 AM 05/02/2002 -0400, Tom wrote:
> > >There are people who have no reaction to poison ivy.  They can pull it
> > >with their bare hands.
> >
> > There is an immunologic phenomenon called 'oral tolerance'.  The gist of
it
> > is, if one is exposed to a potential allergen, via an oral route,
> > particularly at a young age, your immune system is less likely to
> > 'recognize' that allergen as 'foreign'.  Those of us who gained our
initial
> > exposures via the cutaneous(skin) route were destined to develop the
itchy
> > rash in response to subsequent escposures to urushiol.
>
> Hi,
>
> My grandfather had no allergic reaction to poison ivy.  I don't know how
he acquired his
> immunity, I just know there are people out there who can remove it
manually, without having an
> reaction.
>
> I can get a poison ivy rash just thinking about it, so his immunity wasn't
passed to me. (smile)
>
> Later,
> Tom
>
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