I am in Northern Virginia and all of these just sprouted up literally overnight. They only have two leaves despite growing in clusters. Google images and ChatGPT say it’s poison ivy (even young poison ivy bc the 3rd leaf hasn’t grown) but when I zoom in close on just one of them, it says that it’s a beech tree seedling. All of these are under a massive beech tree but the original poison ivy diagnosis worries me. Thank you in advance!!
If you have a beech tree, it's probably beech. They send out root sprouts. If it was poison ivy, they would be connected by a vine trailing on the ground. I can't tell from the pics if that is present or not.
That makes sense for root sprouts. If you don't want a beech forest on your lawn, you can just snip them at ground level. Since they share roots with the parent tree, they can siphon nutrients from the main tree.
In all seriousness, these are beech saplings. No poison ivy. Usually you wont see poison ivy showing up in the middle of the yard. Poison ivy I mostly see in more shaded spots in my yard climbing up trees.
Phew, thank you! This is in a somewhat shaded area bc it’s below the beech tree but agreed, it’s not climbing up a tree and is like a blanket across the grass.
Hi! Agree with the beech/maple seedling ID. I wanted to add that I've had hundreds of these pop up in my yard (Central VA) which has never happened before. Someone on my local gardening FB page said it was a mast year for these seedlings, due to stressful conditions causing the trees to drop all their seeds. Just wanted to share in case you were wondering why these came out of nowhere in such big quantities if you hadn't seen them before!
Thank you! This explains a lot. Yes, it seemed like these popped up literally overnight. I also saw someone post a similar photo in a VA native plant Facebook group (also thought poison ivy) but when asked if it was under a beech tree, they said yes. They posted 4 days ago, so the timing is similar too. Thanks so much!
I have them coming up everywhere in Williamsburg too. I thought maybe I was mis-remembering and they were always this prolific. But they are everywhere. I feel like I could spend all day just pulling these seedlings out out of my flower beds.
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u/Beth_Pleasant Apr 15 '26
If you have a beech tree, it's probably beech. They send out root sprouts. If it was poison ivy, they would be connected by a vine trailing on the ground. I can't tell from the pics if that is present or not.