In article ,
Spider wrote:

.... and remember that the toxic sap will give off cyanide fumes. Make
sure you stand upwind of the smoke.

I doubt that there will be enough to be serious, because hydrogen
cyanide is extremely flammable, with a flash point of -18. See:

Interesting link. Thanks, Nick. All the same, it describes it as
pretty nasty. I would like to think most people would have the sense to
avoid smoke, but I have seen gardeners stubbornly standing in a cloud of
smoke whilst prodding their bonfire. Until the fire becomes hot enough
to reach that flash point (or repel a dozy gardener), surely toxic
vapours will escape? I wouldn't want to risk it.

Er, that's -18 Celsius. If your bonfires are regularly below that,
I suspect that you come from somewhere a long way from here - perhaps
one of the transjovian planets :-)

The carbon monoxide in bonfire smoke can be lethal, but that's
independent of what's being burnt. The only plants that I know of
that produce seriously toxic smoke are some of the sumachs (i.e.
Toxicodendron, and POSSIBLY others) and some tropical ones.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.