Contact Dermatitis Plant "Toxohexadendron"

[A Happy Seedling]

In the woods near Burke Lake, VA, I encountered a huge patch of strange plants that had stems poking a little less than a foot above the ground and six vaguely lobed leaves arranged in a kind of circle at the top. No stem branching. The leaves were kind of purple at the base. They looked like some kind of evil plant from hell. My daughter urged me not to touch it; she said it looked really bad and poisonous; but I grabbed it and pulled it out of the ground anyway . Now I have something that looks like a poison ivy rash all the way up the arm I touched it with. What is this thing? I named it toxohexadendron (Latin roots meaning "poisonous six leaf"), "toxohex" for short, but I don't know squat about it. It isn't poison oak, ivy, or sumac. I looked.

[purpleinopp]

Your description brings to mind giant hogweed. If that's not what you touched, maybe someone else will have an idea, or you'll see another one to photograph.

That said, many plants have toxic sap. It's usually a latex but there are other irritating alkaloids that can cause a contact dermatitis. Some of them rely on UV rays to take effect, phototoxic.

[A Happy Seedling]

Not giant hogweed, not even close. It had no leaves or branches until that top circle. I will try to go back to the park to photograph them. Give me a few weeks to get back there, and I will reply with pictures. Until then, try to see if you have any other suggestions. Thanks for the idea though.

[A Happy Seedling]

Update: May get back to park next Monday. Pix will follow . Also, they don't all have six leaves. The very young ones have two, and then they grow to about half a foot in height and stop growing up. Then they make more leaves as they get older.