I had a small plant come up on its own in my yard last year, and as I didn't recognize it, I figured I would wait to see what it did before ripping it out. It had a spreading habit, like a low, wide shrub or a woody vine. It was lovely, and I admired it very much, but when a second one showed up on my property I thought "once is a lucky happenstance, two is probably a weed..." and went to look it up. Imagine my dismay when the beautiful things turned out to be bittersweet nightshade! It is a gorgeous plant, green with bronze edging, lovely purple flowers with yellow centers and shining oval green berries that turn a lovely scarlet. Sigh.... I donned gloves, got the clippers and stuffed my debris can with regret. Alas, the leaves and berries are both very poisonous. Live and learn. On the more positive side, my hubby came to me concerned because "there's a vine with three leaves growing in the rhododendron out back, I'm afraid it's poison ivy." I went to look and found only the relative innocence of a young blackberry vine lurking in under the leaves. ;-) Would that all invasions were merely spiny. Just thought I'd mention it in case someone else runs into it - I'd never seen nightshade before, only heard of it and didn't know it was pretty.
Lucky you did not get hurt. It's indeed deadly: Warning: graphic image http://www.poison-sumac.org/rash.jpg
Yike Nan that really looks bad!!! I don't know if we have bittersweet nightshade over here but I'll keep an eye out for any plant that looks like the description Prim has given.
We have sumac everywhere.It comes up wild and if you are allergic to it its bad same with poison ivy or oak.
I have loads of nightshade. It pops up everywhere!! I have to be really careful as it keeps sprouting up in my herb garden. I pull it out and luckily, have never been bothered or developed a rash. I had no idea that Nightshade would cause a rash like that!!!
The severity of the rash depends on each of us individually. Some lucky people may not break out in a rash quite as severe as that picture indicates. That picture is pretty horrid.
Just to clarify, I didn't have poison ivy in my yard - it was a false alarm, but in the meantime I have found a third nightshade, this one growing inside one of my large rhodies - also read that they will come back if you leave anything live for it to regenerate from, so I think I'll take a spade to the roots and be sure it's all out. The plant itself isn't dangerous to handle or touch, but ingestion is a bad idea. Supposedly the berries can taste pretty good to kids, etc. - hate to think who had to find that out - so I don't want any of it around. The results of eating the berries can be a narcotic overdose... they would just act weird, go to sleep and not wake up. Yikes.
I wondered about that Primsong. I pull it out all the time and have never had a problem. I DID know that it was poisonous though. It sure does reproduce quickly!
Nan, my husband has a reaction very similiar to the photo in the website you posted. We didn't know we had poison ivy in the yard until almost 2 years after moving into our house. We could not figure out what was going on with him. I'm slightly allergic so it was more of an irratation for me. We went to 3 doctors and got 3 different answers. I finally found a photo online that matched our ivy perfectly. Needless to say I tried to kill the poison ivy but it appears to be growing back. I need to find another way to get rid of it.
