Organic Gardening Tips

Organic Pesticide Production

Organic gardeners do not use chemical pesticides because the chemicals and their residues are harmful to the environment, and because of the unknown health risks those relatively new chemicals can pose to people and pets. Nicotine, which occurs naturally in tobacco, can be used as a natural pesticide with no real unknown effects, beyond those normally associated with tobacco. Unlike many synthetic chemical poisons which actually soak into the plant, nicotine spray can be washed off of your foodcrops.

Even if you don't intend to smoke or chew tobacco, our fast growing strain of Turkish tobacco can be protecting your ornamental or vegetable plants from bugs within 9 weeks of starting the tobacco seed, saving your plants from bug damage and your health from lab created carcinogenic poisons.

The whole process of making and using nicotine spray should be done wearing rubber gloves, such as dishwashing gloves, to prevent too much nicotine soaking into your skin. If any gets on skin or clothes it should be washed off right away, just like any other poison. Also the solution should be labeled and kept away from children. Use common sense; it is a poison, just not a lab-created one.

Making your own organic nicotine spray is easy. Using fresh (not dried) tobacco leaf, chop or shred 2 or 3 ounces leaf per gallon. To make a 3 gallon batch, use a clean 5 gallon plastic pail, and put 6 to 10 ounces (about 1 gallon packed; the exact amounts aren't critical) fresh chopped tobacco leaf in the bottom. Fill slightly more than half way with hot but not boiling water, stirring occasionally. Let it sit covered for 12 hours or overnight.

Pour through a pillowcase to filter solids out, saving the liquid in a second clean pail. Wring out the pillowcase to extract the last of the liquid. The soggy leaf residue can be composted. The filtered liquid is poured into a pump up sprayer and can be sprayed on the top and bottom surfaces of plants' leaves as well as directly on bugs. Whenever possible, avoid spraying beneficial insects such as ladybugs and praying mantes. It does not 'kill on contact', but the bugs directly sprayed will not survive more than a day or two.