Hello everyone, I’m not too sure where to post this.

My name is Katie and I am a Freshman Chemistry major at Texas A&M University. For one of my chemistry classes I have to do a presentation about the advantages/disadvantages of organic and chemical pesticides.

I wanted to know if any of you had any easy to make organic recipes that I could use in class for a demonstration. My group was hoping show the affects on ants and other bugs when using organic as opposed to chemical pesticides. I’d appreciate any help you can give me.

-Katie

Hi Katie. I am here at A&M too. I know this is only a class project, but it sure would be great if we could get A&M to promote organics more. I wonder if they get grant money from the pesticide and fertilizer companies because they seem all about chemicals. Here is a web site with organic formulas:
http://www.htv10.com/nature/020721/intro/index.html

Also the Home Brew section of this web site has some stuff. Good luck!

Thanks for your help!

This is one of the best things I've written on this subject. Feel free to convince your instructors of the advantages of organics with it if you can.

Here's a list of things an organic program can do that no chemical can do. The beneficial microbes in the soil do the following.

1. Decompose plant residues and manure to humus.
2. Retain nutrients in humus.
3. Combine nitrogen and carbon to prevent nutrient loss.
4. Suppress disease.
5. Produce plant growth regulators.
6. Develop soil structure, tilth, and water penetration/retention.
7. Clean up chemical residues.
8. Shift soil pH to neutral and keep it there.
9. Search out and retrieve nutrients in distant parts of the soil.
10. Decompose thatch and keep it from returning.
11. Control nitrogen supply to the plants according to need.
12. Pull minerals out of inorganic soil components for plants.
13. Provide the exact chemical nutrients to the plant that the plant has evolved with rather than man's cheapest chemical approximation.
14. Provide exactly the required quantity of nutrients that the plant needs.
15. Provide the nutrients at exactly the right time that the plant needs them.

No chemical can do any of that. To be fair, no single microbe can do all of that either. In fact, it could be that it takes 100 different species, one working right after the other, to do any one item in the above list - sort of like a microbiological assembly line. But at least it's real easy to get all the right microbes. The biology of the soil is very complicated.
At the same time, many chemicals inhibit the microbe's natural abilities to do these things. Herbicides, fungicides, and pesticides are all designed to kill various biological life. As a byproduct, they often kill off the beneficial microbes that are doing 1 through 15 above. Any break in the assembly line can interrupt the process, damage the mini ecosystem, and lessen the benefit of the organic methods.

_________________
David Hall
Moderator
Dirt Doctor Lawns Forum

David,

Your information was very detailed and very helpful. It will help me in my explanation to the class. You also introduced some new things that I hadn’t found so far in my research. (ie: Shift soil pH to neutral and keep it there.)

Your information was *very* beneficial. Thanks.

Katie, I'm new to this website and "somewhat" new to organic gardening. During my research stage I ran across a website that gives great information about beneficial insects for large scale farming, an alternative to pesticides. This website might be of interest and helpful for you.

http://www.biofac.com/About_Us/about_us.html

Best of luck on your presentation - Susan

Katie, I used to have a sever problem with cut ants. We couldn't grow anything without trying to prevent the ants from climbing on the plants and stripping them. An older friend treated all five cut ant mounds near us in february when they did not have eggs with bromide gas. It got all the mounds. We missed one near my house.

I decided to try carbon monoxide. I parked my pickup near it and inserted a two inch pvc pipe. Inside the end of it I placed a vacuum cleaner hose. At the end I made a smaller pointed thing with a hole in it. I inserted it into a large hole in the mound and covered dirt around it. I covered all holes I could find elsewhere and turned on my pickup. I left it running the exhaust into the hole for around 20 minutes. My last ant problem was eliminated. I do not have any more cut ants. They are dead. I can only assume I killed the new mound, since there are no ants anymore. Pretty significant!