POISON PENMANSHIP

POISON: A substance that causes death or serious injury to a living organism, especially when this happens quickly from a relatively small dose; it does not discriminate and its effects should apply equally to all.

By this definition, an allergen is not a poison, since it does not usually kill; it affects some but not others.

Poison Ivy is not poisonous and should more properly be Skin-Rash Ivy. About 15% of people are immune to its dangers. This makes the plant a very common hazard with 85% as potential victims. In most other allergic encounters with plant parts, the numbers are beyond the decimal point.

Some sufferers are so outraged and believing that since it happened to them, that it will happen to others, they alert the whole tribe. In fact they might only be one of a very sensitive few; perhaps uniquely so. One person whose complaint I found on the Internet was so angry at their allergic reaction to Foxglove (they got hives) that they demanded that it should be treated like smallpox and be eradicated from the planet.

People new to gardening must be quite concerned to see so many popular plants readily available at garden centres although they are “known to be poisonous to humans’. With some thought they come to realize that they cannot be all that poisonous or they would not continue to be sold. Obviously the plants have already passed through many hands, from the growers and propagators to greenhouse workers who prune, deadhead and cut back in daily close encounters. They quite rightly ignore the doomsayers and dodge the falling sky.
It has been pointed out to me that I do not find any poisonous plants among the 72 names as given in ‘Information for Families-Plant Safety’ and I do not define ‘poison’. Note that the Hospital does not offer a definition either and no information. Their intent seems to be to scare people into sticking to our familiar vegetables and not to eat garden ornamentals. I could endorse that thought, I suppose.
 I did not give them all a clean bill of health. Where I believed that there might be cause for concern I have tried to explain and to reassure that in normal usage any toxic content can be safely disregarded.
 In trying to inform I have done a great deal more than this poor effort from Sick Kids’.
Are there any poisonous plants on the list? Perhaps a couple that might qualify but how are families to know which ones out of this miscellany? I have no intention to add to a list derived from garbled folklore or the problems that farmers must contend with in animal husbandry nor when used as self-medication for self-diagnosed ailments.
I am outraged to see in a publication addressed to families with a home garden, a warning about the dangerous potential of Delphiniums and Larkspur based on some awareness that a couple of weedy types have proven harmful to grazing cattle in some western States. There are 250 species of Delphiniums including Larkspurs and as many or more cultivated varieties. They are not poisonous to humans, not even the few that can harm animals. We are not cattle. We do not consume by the bushel nor graze by the acre.