Selfsufficientish.com

do you use soapy water to kill aphids? does it work? how do you make it? would you still see it as organic?

thanks

You could grow quinoa if you want to be truely organic, soak the saponins off of the grains surface, eat the grain and spray the soapy water on the plants :)

It depends on the soap you're using. If it's pure vegetable soap, without any nasty stuff then I'd consider it as an organic option. It does work but you need to apply it more than once. I find the most effective method of control is to squash them, but if there's a big infestation it's a bit daunting. Go with the soap.

In the past I've used a squirt of washing up liquid in a spray bottle of water, which seemed to work reasonably well. I don't suppose that was organic though!

I must admit I enjoy the ultimate green method - squashing the little buggers between my fingers, but alas, it's not very effective :)

pskipper wrote:You could grow quinoa if you want to be truely organic, soak the saponins off of the grains surface, eat the grain and spray the soapy water on the plants :)

Quinoa???????? Do mean quinoa???? I'd be so up for this method. Have you tried it? And succeeded? How long do you soak for? Am I missing anything else?

Thank-you...

Trinity
x

p.s what do you mean grow quinoa? Can we grow it in the UK?

Hi Trinity.
Here is a site I looked up on quinoa (keen-wa).

www.vegparadise.com/highestperch36.html

Reading the blurb makes me want to get some and try it.

Robin

Thank you Robin It's something I use regularly, so I am very keen to try out its insect repellant properties!

Trinity

My Great-Gran was a real self sufficient country woman. She taught me most of what I know about gardening etc.

She used to boil rhubarb leaves in water, then when the 'juice' was good and strong, cool it and then spray the greenfly. It worked very well, especially if you happen to be cooking the rhubarb anyway. BUT the juice is poison to humans too, so beware... you have been warned.