permaculture

[Marimike6@cs.com]

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• From: Marimike6@cs.com
• To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.com
• Subject: Re: [permaculture] Poison ivy eradication
• Date: Fri, 13 Jun 2003 17:03:09 EDT

From: Michael Burns
Subject: Re: [permaculture] rhubarb


I am also curious as I have a frightenly large patch of poison ivy I'd
like to eradicate. My tolerance/resistance to p.i. is absolutely zero. I
need to find a safe way to remove it and have considered sheet mulching,
comfrey and/or rhubarb. I'm so sensitive to it I will also need to find
someone to do the work! Anyone have ideas for a design/method?

We have a lot of the stuff around North Carolina, and I don't know of any chemical treatment whether organic or store-bought that will kill it at the root by above-ground application. You have to pull up the roots, which fortunately are usually shallow. Use a narrow garden rake (hard tine) or a garden claw. Once the plants dry up, put on some gloves, get it into trash bags for disposal and head to the shower immediately. Soap and water applied within the first 45 minutes is usually effective in preventing the rash. Don't think you were meticulous and didn't touch any of it except with the gloves-- believe me, some of it got on you.

Of course if you have the jumbo, tree-size poison ivy like they have up in the Delaware Valley, there's only one cure that works.

Move away.

Mike Elvin

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