i've used a more expensive, stronger forumulation of Round-Up on Poison Ivy with success. it worked well despite the oleoresin coating the leaves and also produced by the stems, vines, etc. forget the exact name, but i still have some in the chemical "locker" in the basement workshop.
it wasn't the "Poison Ivy" version. had it been in the small local H/W Store, i would have tried it instead.
to those with some degree of immunity. don't squander it. each exposure to the oleoresin that poison ivy (in all its variegated forms - shrub, groundcover-like, climbing vines, etc.), poison sumac (WHITE berries, not red - grows in very wet areas), and poison oak (out west) increases one's sensitivity to it, thus, making it easier to develop a rxn to it. contact with broken skin (even from shaving - my first rxn/outbreak at the age of 17 despite many previous contacts with no effects) may rapidly push one over the "threshold" of sensitivity.
I DON'T ADVOCATE DOING THE FOLLOWING:
the Native Americans in the NE had a practice of eating three poison ivy leaves each week, beginning when they first appeared in the Spring. this apparently conferred an immunity. while this seems to contradict my warning above, it is something entirely different. it is NOT a massive dose of the oleoresin at one time. it is more analogous to what an allergist might do when one is getting allergy shots. a little bit of the allergen at one time, beginning with a very small dose and increasing it gradually.
Euell Gibbons, writer and naturalist (in the field biology sense), and old-time Post Grape-Nuts "pitchman" on TV commercials, read of this practice of the Native Americans and decided to give it a whirl since he would get Poison Ivy reactions each year as part of his time in the field. The procedure worked for Mr. Gibbons and he wrote of it in one of the books that he wrote (i have them all upstairs on one of the library shelves).
I DON'T ADVOCATE DOING THE ABOVE:
WARNING:
Some decades ago, three older acquaintances (in their early twenties at the time), who never had rxns to poison ivy contact (they even grabbed it, more than once, and rubbed it on their bodies), decided to eat some FULL GROWN poison ivy leaves. all three were hospitalized. proof positive that...
too much oleoresin + too much testosterone + too lil' common sense = somethin' bad happens.
'nuff said.
I have only used it on the weeds/grass growing up in cracks as our back yard has a large area covered with slate/bluestone. Thanks for the sharp eye, BB.
