Yesterday I was mowing down a clump of extremely wet elephant ears that produce runners underground and was going to spray them with roundup afterwards. The lawnmower blower got clogged and after stopping the machine I laid down on the ground and reached under mower to clean out the clippings. I forgot that elephant ears are loaded with oxalic acid. As a result my arms and legs are on fire and have been since yesterday. It was like being stung with thousands of red ants. I will not be doing that again-ever!!!!
Hope this helps so that no one else makes this mistake.
CAUTION when mowing down elepant ears
Gosh Barb,I hope you will be OK,are you using anything? maybe Aloe?
OHGosh I never new that! Hope you're feeling better today!
Gosh...How awful! I have been told that aroids are full of Idioblasts....which can affect people differently.
Friends of mine, here, cut down a big tree covered with a velvet leaf Philodendron. She has lesions all over her arm as the acid ate through flesh and he...well he had to be given steroids because he became so swollen he couldn't walk!!! The only thing that "cured" the lesions on her arms was letting the dog clean them out. Sounds gross...but they began to dry in 3 hours.
Be careful.....DH got some of that same stuff on his face and arms from the same Philo and hydrogen peroxide helped a bit.
Oh my gosh Barb. This sounds horrible. I hope you will be okay soon. That can't be a comfortable feeling.
Gosh Barb, I never knew any of this! Thanks for this information and I hope you're feeling 'good as new' VERY SOON!!!
Barb I hope you are better soon. Thanks for posting this I had no idea. I guess I better be more careful with my ears.
I did not know this. Thanks for the post Barb. I sure hope it clears up soon!
Barb,
hope you feel better real soon, be careful with those critters!(EE's) :-)
Thanks everyone-the burning is almost gone.
Barb!!! geez girl... I would have NEVER thought that.. thanks for telling us and I'm sorry you had to learn the hard way. Please e-mail me.. my hard drive is sitting next to me in a box containing all of its secrets for the past 3 years.. new hard drive in but it is a blank slate... I have something that I need to get to you... before it turns into a tree.. *LOL*
I learned at the greenhouse I worked in many years ago, that the aroids have oxalic acid in them. We used Baking Soda to neutralize it. We kept a bucket of baking soda water at the entrance to the aroid house just in case. It worked.
Oh gosh!! Im glad to hear the burning is getting better! Im sorry "we" had to learn that terrible lesson that way. I would have not even thought about it.
Wishing a VERY quick healing time.
Calalily, I tried the baking soda but the oxalic acid was in such a concentration that it did not work. By mulching the ee's, it produced a pesto of the elephant ears.
Oh Barb, you must have been in misery! I can't imagine having that much of the juice from those plants on my skin. Did you find anything that helped?