"hugh" ] wrote in message
...
In message , Franz Heymann
writes

"Sacha" wrote in message
. uk...
On 18/7/04 8:44 pm, in article
, "Howard
Neil"
wrote:

BAC wrote:

Sorry about that - I use the term 'pesticides' to include
herbicides,
insecticides, fungicides, etc. I don't think I'm alone in
that,
but
apologise for any confusion. In this context, I meant
weedkiller,
specifically one not fatal to lawn grass.

You are correct in your use of the term "pesticide". It is a
general
term that includes herbicides, insecticides and fungicides.
Weed
killer
is a herbicide which then means that it is a pesticide.

You may use it in that way but nobody else I know does so.
Herbicide is not
pesticide. We do not use pesticides on this nursery but very
occasionally
we use herbicides. As we use biological controls in the
greenhouses, the
difference is very marked and it would be sloppy to encourage
people
to use
'pesticides' when one might mean 'herbicides', IMO.

According to the Encyclopedia Brittanica, a pesticide is "any toxic
substance used to kill animals or plants that cause economic damage
to
crop or ornamental plants or are hazardous to the health of
domestic
animals or humans." It goes on in a vein which *explicitly*
includes
herbicides, insecticides, fungicides and fumigants.

Herbicides are therefore included in the term "pesticide".

Not according to the Oxford Dictionary.

Then the score becomes 14 - 1 in favour of regarding a herbicide as a
pesticide. The 14 come from horticultural and scientific atricles and
the 1 from the OED. The OED is not very reliable about scientific
definitions. It has seriously incorrect entries for "proton",
"electron", "neutron" and "meson", just for starters.

Franz