Recent Post on Poison Ivy got me thinking...

Whether it's technically an "immunity" or not.. I've never had it...ever... and i'm 40.... and I've spent soooooooo much time in the woods- to the point where now I don't even care what plants I touch now or even watch out for it- and I almost always wear shorts.

From what I can gather- Medically, its not clear certain whether you can be "immune"- I guess you can have a flare-up at any point regardless since its an allergic reaction...

But it got me thinking - is anyone else on here in the same camp?- Don't even give poison ivy a second thought- because it doesn't affect you?

Grizzlyman: "Recent Post on Poison Ivy got me thinking...

Whether it's technically an "immunity" or not.. I've never had it...ever... and i'm 40.... and I've spent soooooooo much time in the woods- to the point where now I don't even care what plants I touch now or even watch out for it- and I almost always wear shorts.

From what I can gather- Medically, its not clear certain whether you can be "immune"- I guess you can have a flare-up at any point regardless since its an allergic reaction...

But it got me thinking - is anyone else on here in the same camp?- Don't even give poison ivy a second thought- because it doesn't affect you?



"

It is not uncommon to not be sensitized to urushoil, the allergenic compound found in poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac. As much as 50% of the population is not sensitized to the compound. Sensitivity may also wane with increased age.

What you might be risking is carrying the urushoil compound back home on your clothes or gear which then exposes someone who is sensitized.

OCDave: "

Grizzlyman: "Recent Post on Poison Ivy got me thinking...


Whether it's technically an "immunity" or not.. I've never had it...ever... and i'm 40.... and I've spent soooooooo much time in the woods- to the point where now I don't even care what plants I touch now or even watch out for it- and I almost always wear shorts.


From what I can gather- Medically, its not clear certain whether you can be "immune"- I guess you can have a flare-up at any point regardless since its an allergic reaction...


But it got me thinking - is anyone else on here in the same camp?- Don't even give poison ivy a second thought- because it doesn't affect you?



"

It is not uncommon to not be sensitized to urushoil, the allergenic compound found in poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac. As much as 50% of the population is not sensitized to the compound. Sensitivity may also wane with increased age.


What you might be risking is carrying the urushoil compound back home on your clothes or gear which then exposes someone who is sensitized. "

I'am somewhat immune to it. I spend a lot of time in the woods cutting trees and prepping my own firewood. Wife does the wash and gets poison ivy/ oak- and I rarely wear long pants / long sleeves. This has happened several times.

I've had poison ivy and poison oak a number of times, but not in the last 10 years or so. I've been wearing shorts on portages and walked through thick poison ivy with no ill effect. Never sure if I'm somehow immune now or some poison ivy just isn't very potent.

I had always thought I was immune to poison ivy. I had come into contact with it on few occasions without issue. Then one day I was cutting a tree down after a rain storm in shorts. I knew I was in poison ivy but paid no attention to it. The next day I had my first reaction too it. Not fun!!

I am immune to poison ivy when I was 19-20 years old I backed the corn planter into a shaded area to do maintenance. I had been crawling around under the planter with a grease gun (no shirt and just shorts and work boots) when I stood up and started to pick up my tools I noticed that I was laying in a large poison ivy patch. I never got a blister.
Now Poison Sumac that's another story.

yeah I don't know how it works but I have also never been affected by ivy or oak. Nor has anyone in my family and we go up there around 3 times a year and aren't very careful.

Three incidents lead me to believe I’m not allergic to it. The first one was when I was in my early teens and went berry picking with a couple cousins. We were in the same exact places but both the son of my dad’s sister and the son of one of my dad’s brothers got covered with rashes. Alan even got it, uhhm, in his swimsuit area.

The second time was at a stay at the cabin of a friend of my dad’s. We were to clear brush and weeds in return for the week stay. My grandfather was shocked to see I was pulling up poison ivy without any gloves and throwing it in the burn pile. He told me to get it out of the burn pile because if the smoke was inhaled, the reaction could happen in the lungs, and I could kill someone.

The third was after telling a friend about the other incidents, and he wanted to test me. He had a big patch of it along his property line. I waved my arms through it but would not rub the sap on my face. I knew that like any allergy, a reaction could happen at any time.

The last time I was exposed was last summer on Minnesota Point in Duluth. Although I didn’t touch it with bare skin, I walked through it. It is almost impossible not to. Its all over down there if anyone wants to test themselves.

As a child I could play in it and never get a reaction. My brother was super-sensitive to it and he was very envious of me.

So, I never worried about it for most of my adult life. Then suddenly at the age of 60 I was exposed while doing some yard work at our lake cottage. The reaction was very bad--and since then I have gotten it a few times. It seems it took me a long time to develop a sensitivity.

We found that scrubbing with Zanfel is the best way to keep a severe reaction from happening when we are exposed.

I don't know if I am immune or not but I have never had a breakout from it. I have been in the woods and running tree lines and fence rows my whole life. That said I don't chance it. If I am out in it I don't lay down and roll around in it but I don't really worry about it or look for it. I do look for things with thorns or prickers though. I tend to wind up quite tangled at times if I am not looking out for them.

I don't react to poison ivy, but try to avoid it. It's kind of like bee stings---you might not have any kind of reaction and then suddenly have a severe one.

I don't think there is as much PI in the upper Midwest as there is in the central or southern Midwest. IMHO.

I'm pretty much in the same camp. Have never had a poison ivy reaction. I did have a small/mild reaction to wild parsnip once, when I was doing some volunteer prairie restoration work at Wolf Road Prairie in the Chicago suburbs. But poison ivy, no. Doesn't mean I'll get arrogant/careless about it or anything, because I know sometimes these things change. Knocking on wood that I stay resistant to poison ivy and relatively undesirable to mosquitos!

This is a great post.

I've often wondered if I had some type of immunity. It looks like it's not uncommon at all. I've never once had poison ivy, oak or sumac. I've done a fair amount of bushwhacking in Northern Minnesota, and spent a lot of time in the woods in the Army. I just figured I would have come into contact with it sometime in my 54 years.

Mike

Great topic.

When I was a child and teenager, I would get it so bad I had to get prednizone, a steroid to reduce the inflammation. I even have scars on my inner thighs from the terrible welts and my terrible scratching.

Now as a middle age adult, I rarely if ever get it, and it is very reduced. A small itchy line here and there, but nothing like the massive patches that would cover large swaths of my body.

Granted, I am more conscious of it when I am in the woods, and I try very hard to wash well when I get back, as this is supposed to get the oil off the skin if done in a timely manner.

My grandfather would actually rip it out of the ground with his bare hands and never had a welt. He attributed it to some native blood that he claimed he had. We never did enough genealogy to prove or disprove this "theory", but he was certainly immune.

I didn't get any until I was 51 years old, then got just a bit.

Ivy doesn't bother me, might get a 1 day small rash, don't go play in it, but I do have a bumper crop of it on my property that I constantly have chop back to keep it under control. I think poison oak and sumac are very rare, especially up north. I'm in central Indiana and poison ivy is everywhere around here.

Nope, never had a reaction to it. I look for it to warn other folks, but I don't worry about it that much. Never had any problems with oak or sumac either. My oldest son, however, had a pretty severe reaction to sumac, when he was a teen-ager.

Poison ivy has never bothered me. I can ignore it since I have no reaction to it. My young and strong next door neighbor is very sensitive to it and gets big ugly rashes from it.

I fixed up a cabin where I had to take my boat up stream on the vermillion River. Then haul everything on a long path from the landing to the cabin.... I worked all weekend and I kinda thought the “oak leaves” were funny shaped. I worked in Duluth at a foundry and that Sunday night I blistered out pretty good. It took weeks for it to go away. But I’ve never got poison ivy. Our ball field had a bunch in the perimeter that I work to control. So I know I’m exposed to it.

I'm 70 and never had a reaction to any of the three poisons. I can't even tell you what poison ivy looks like. My daughter is very sensitive to it.

I think I could get a rash just from looking at a picture of poison ivy. Pretty sure I'll get one from reading this thread.

I've never paid much attention to it. One time I was walking thru a large patch of it when my husband asked if I knew what I was walking thru. Poison ivy of course. No reaction. A few years ago I had a small 1 inch reaction to something near my ankle, I'm guessing it was ivy, so now I'm more aware, but not paranoid.

RTurner: "I think I could get a rash just from looking at a picture of poison ivy. Pretty sure I'll get one from reading this thread."

Me too, I can feel the itching already!! I was immune until I was 18, my dad was immune until well in to his 50's, and my brother until his death at 31. We all literally lived in it until we became sensitized to it. They say noone gets it on their first exposure and you can become sensitized or immune any time during your life.

I was also in the "if I looked at it wrong, I got it" crew as a kid. Have been vigilant since. Not going to test the "age waning allergy thing "....... I believe it..... just not going to test it!!!

I had a bad case of it about 7 years ago and always look for that little leaf now. It could really derail a trip for me if not careful. I always wear long pants on travel days.

One of the nice things about the BWCA is that there is very little poison ivy... at least compared to Ohio, where it is rampant.

Anyone know of a way to control/eliminate it in the wild....pipe dream I am sure, but I fantasize about releasing dozens of goats to clean out the state parks from poison ivy here in Ohio. Then I probably would complain about all the goat skat!

mgraber: "

RTurner: "I think I could get a rash just from looking at a picture of poison ivy. Pretty sure I'll get one from reading this thread."

Me too, I can feel the itching already!! I was immune until I was 18, my dad was immune until well in to his 50's, and my brother until his death at 31. We all literally lived in it until we became sensitized to it. They say noone gets it on their first exposure and you can become sensitized or immune any time during your life."

My wife is in the look at it, get it crowd. My son probably was near 30 when he got his first dose, I'm 67 and never had it , I'm in the outdoors year round and that stuff is thick here. I have read that if you keep exposing yourself to it that you'll probably get it some day. I try and avoid it if I can do so easily, mostly because I have to do the laundry so the wife doesn't get it. I don't let it stop me from going or doing what I want in the outdoors.

RTurner: "I think I could get a rash just from looking at a picture of poison ivy. Pretty sure I'll get one from reading this thread."

Haha. Me too. Nothing until after age 30, despite lots of woods growing up. Last outbreak I got from swimming near a tree that fell into the lake during a storm. Tree had poison ivy near its trunk... Maybe also on its bark or climbing the tree. Ugh.

One thing I learned the hard way was not to take a long hot shower or bath after exposure because that opens your pores and at least for me can create a systemic reaction. So cold water to wash it off!