| Home |
| Search |
| Today's Posts |
|
#16
24-11-2010, 10:23 AM
posted to uk.rec.gardening
|
|||
|
|||
Caffeine versus slugs & snails
On 24/11/2010 09:53, Janet wrote:
In , says... In , Bob wrote: The only problem I see is that DEFRA have not given it a licence to be used as a pesticide, it has not been tested as such, and we therefor do not know what damage it would cause to the environment as a whole. It might also kill birds and others that eat the contaminated slugs for example, it might do irreparable damage to the soil flora/fauna. I doubt that very much. The chemical caffeine is not that nasty. Curiously the LD50 for caffeine is about the same as pure glyphosate. Yeah. And it might super-stimulate the slugs, so they go racing round the garden, or even sprout wings and fly. Given the massive experience we have of composting them in open heaps, the effect on birds is almost certainly nil to negligible, and we can be certain that it won't cause irreparable damage to the soil flora and fauna. If broken up tea/coffee leaves contained an effective pesticide/deterrent/herbicide I'd expect tea/coffee plantations to be pretty pest-proof/ weed proof, but they aren't. Growers contend with multiple weeds/pests. That doesn't follow at all. There are pests specific to a given host and static monoculture like tea or coffee plantations always create problems with the wrong pests finding a huge concentration of host plants. Nicotine in tobacco plants is another extremely potent toxic insecticide (extracts were even used as such in the past) but tobacco plants still need protection from the various pest insects that have co-evolved to tolerate or avoid the poison. http://www.ikisan.com/links/ap_tobac...nagement.shtml Regards, Martin Brown |
| Thread Tools | Search this Thread |
| Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads
|
||||
| Thread | Forum | |||
| Tomatoes - Ace versus Early Girl versus ? | Edible Gardening | |||
| Runner Beans & Slugs & Snails | United Kingdom | |||
| British gov't to protect snails, slugs from pain & distress | United Kingdom | |||
| Caffeine for slugs and snail control | Orchids | |||
| (OT) Caffeine for slugs and snail control | Orchids | |||
Threaded Mode
