Vinegar will take the tops off the plants. Repeated applications will eventually exhaust the supply of nutrients in the roots and the plant will die.

Between pavers I use a weed whacker.

I suppose goats are out of the question, huh?

These two plants are often mis-identified. The Virginia creeper has often been called poison ivy and only twice in about 20 instances has poison oak been accurately identified to me. In those two cases I was able to cut off the plant at ground level and carefully remove it. There was a little rhyme that went, "leaves of three, let them be."

If the area isn't too large you might try smothering the poison ivy with an old pond liner or roofing underlayment. Keep it covered anywhere from a week to a month or two and the heat and lack of air/sun might kill it.

I was going to mention virginia creeper also. It has leaves in clumps of five and is often misidentified as Poision Oak.

Even though I try to be organic as much as possible, I will break out weed killer (Ortho Brush B Gone) for Poison Ivy in certain areas. I am very allergic. I've tried cutting it off, but invariably it gets on my tools or my clothes or my dog and I end up getting a severe (and I mean hospitalized for blood poisoning) rash. So I let it be, if its growing in areas where I won't be in contact with it. But if it creeps up my shed or a tree in the mown area of my property.

I take off my organic hat and put on the chemical one.

Thanks everyone, for your advice. I will google virginia creeper and try to figure out what it is that I actually have back there.

Joepyeweed, my husband has also ended up in the ER with blood poisoning from getting into poison ivy, so I understand wanting to get rid of it asap. I have tried to keep him away from this back area until I figure out what to do with it back there!