Whenever I take a group on a hike, someone always asks me what poison ivy, Toxicodendron radicans looks like. Someone inevitably recites, “Leaves of three, let them be.” I always mention that I love to eat raspberries and strawberries, which also have three leaves. So how do you really know?
Poison Ivy has compound leaves with three leaflets (leading to the saying “leaves of three, let it be”). It is really important to know how to identify poison ivy throughout the year because it is ever changing and the oils are always potent and can give you the rash regardless if it has leaves or not.
Here are pictures to help you identify poison ivy throughout the year. I hope they help.
The twig breaks through the dried up fall leaves and comes up in early spring.
When the leaves first appear in the spring, they are red and are very shiny.
When looking at the three leaflets notice how they do not all look alike, at least one looks like a mitten.
Poison Ivy is a vine, and very hairy. There are many other woodland vines but none are as hairy.
Poison Ivy changes colors in the fall along with all the other deciduous plants.
Mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum) emerges in early spring. It is also known as American Mandrake, the English version has been known to scream when pulled out of the ground, driving a person insane before it kills them ~ remember the scene in Harry Potter?
No worries, the American Mandrake does not exhibit this behavior.
When Mayapple first emerges, it looks more like a dark green mushroom with a spiral cap than a plant.
Emerging Mayapple
As the leaf starts to unfold it looks like a wonderful beach umbrella for faeries. Some call it the witch’s umbrella, but the witches would need to be very small. Its botanical name Podophyllum peltatum means “foot leaf like a shield,” and once you see the leaf fully opened you can understand why it was given that name.
On one of my most recent hikes, I noticed that the fruits seemed to only develop on plants that had twin-leaves. The fruits hung between the two leaves. I could not find any fruits hanging from any of the single leaf plants that I looked at.
Fruiting Mayapple
Although, the American plant will not drive you insane, all the parts of the Mayapple plant are quite poisonous, except the very ripe fruit. To give you an idea as how toxic ~ Native Americans used the plant to commit suicide. So what does a ripe Mayapple look like? First, the unripe Mayapple resembles a lime. When it turns a soft, yellow and wrinkles a little, it is ripe. The rest of the plant is also often dying at that time as well. If you are adventurous, trim off the ends, and just eat the pulp of the fruit and remember, do not eat the seeds. I am a forager but not that adventurous, I tend to stay away from eating things that could kill me, therefore have never eaten the fruit of the Mayapple. Besides, I have never come across a very ripe fruit on my hikes. Most of the critters get them the moment they are ripe and there aren’t any left for the truly adventurous foragers.
Besides being deadly Mayapples have very powerful medicine that’s used in cancer treatment. Two anti-cancer drugs that are made from the Mayapple are etoposide and teniposide. Etoposide is for testicular and small-cell lung cancer, teniposide is used in conditions like brain tumors and infancy leukemia. Therefore, used appropriately Mayapple is deadly to cancer while giving a person a chance to live. It’s a beautiful thing.
All information is shared for educational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose or treat any condition.
