Be cautious

Poison ivy growing up a tree and branching out from it.

Notice the fine poison ivy root hairs making it look fuzzy.

A tree nearly covered with poison ivy vines.

 At this time of year the roots and stems of poison ivy are very obvious.  Please be careful as some people react quickly and severely to poison ivy.  My husband seems to have a reaction by just looking at it.

The oils that cause an allergic reaction are not just on the leaves.  They are on the vines and roots and even leave a residue on a tree after the vine has been pulled down.  When Kevin (my husband) was putting up a swing from the tree branches for our children (all grown up now) he had a reaction because the limb he was hanging the swing from had been overgrown with poison ivy a few years earlier.

A student teacher was teaching art in a nearby school and she wanted the students to make a winter collage.  So, on the weekend she went out to gather materials and she brought in many twigs for her students to use in their creations.  Most of her students ended up with rashes and swelling from the oils left on the poison ivy stems.  She had no idea she was exposing them to something harmful.  I wonder what grade the student teacher got.

My point is that you should learn to identify poison ivy even before the leaves come out.