Native Plants
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Wednesday - November 11, 2015
From: Ringgold, GA
Region: Southeast
Topic: General Botany, Poisonous Plants, Vines
Title: Is Poison ivy always rooted in the ground?
Answered by: Guy Thompson
QUESTION:
Does Poison ivy on a tree always start at the ground and climb up the tree or can it start producing its vine and leaves by itself at the top of the tree or middle?ANSWER:
There are three subspecies of Toxicodendron radicans (Eastern poison ivy), all similar in appearance. Poison ivy can grow as a small shrub or as a vine tightly attached to a tree or wall. In all cases the vine derives all its sustenance from its own roots. The many aerial rootlets that sometimes attach the vine to a tree trunk may look as though they penetrate into the tree and extract nutrients, but they only serve to hold the vine to the surface of the bark.
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