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[TBM]

Many essential oils out there can be used aromatically to repel insects and other pests. I made this post as a place to compile lists of what each essential oil is capable of repelling.

You can use a variety of essential oils as a repellant simply by putting drops onto cloth/paper strips and hanging around your garden. You can also get creative by making a blend of oils suitable for your current needs and soaking the strips in it, you could also use cotton balls, or you could soak a cotton string and hang the string to disperse the pest repelling aroma.

Be sure to use organic and food grade quality essential oils whenever possible!

Peppermint:

• Ants
• Aphids
• Beetles
• Caterpillars
• Flies
• Moths
• Spiders
• Plant lice

Thyme:

• Beetles
• Chiggers
• Cutworms
• Roaches
• Ticks

Rosemary:

• Cabbage caterpillars
• Flies
• Mosquitoes

Lavender:

• Chiggers
• Flies
• White flies
• Mosquitoes
• Moths
• Spiders
• Ticks

Sage:

• Chiggers
• White flies
• Cutworms
• Ticks
• Nematodes

Lemongrass:

• Chiggers
• Mosquitoes
• Ticks

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[TBM]

Citronella:

• Ants
• Flies
• Gnats
• Nematodes
• Ticks

Cedarwood:

• Aphids
• Slugs
• Snails
• Moths
• Weevils

Spearmint:

• Ants
• Aphids
• Gnats
• Caterpillars
• Moths
• Spiders
• Plant lice

Clove:

• Ants
• Aphids
• Flies
• Wasps

This list is in no way complete! Feel free to post additional information about any essential oils I've missed!

2 Likes Roze and ONandONandON like this.

[chamomeleon]

While is is not an essential oil, nicotine will repel/ kill just about any insect you could want.  As well as your roses.     And don't get any on you or your pets.  Otherwise, nicotine is an amazing insecticide and a perfect reason to grow tobacco.  Always go for nicotina rustica, as it has a fairly high nicotine content.

Now back to your previously scheduled programming.

[BubbleCat]

Lavender on spidermites worked nice. I never use them outdoors but when I have a pest attack in the indoor garden I vaporise essential oils and see what happens, if one works again and again I conclude its not coincidences. So lavender works, better when sprayed with a drop of dish wash.

Also in many cases instead of the sacre / expensive essential oil the infusion / tea containing the oils works just as fine, also makes a nice spray. Aromatic plants are awesome to experiment with on pests.

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[Stonehenge]

I wonder if lavender applied to the skin will keep away mosquitoes?

[TBM]

Yes, as long as the essential oil is considered safe for topical use it should work. You should always dilute essential oils into a carrier oil like sweet almond oil or coconut oil when applying topically. You could also make an essential oil-water solution (with maybe a bit of alcohol added to get the oil and water to mix) and mist yourself if you so chose to. Not really sure which method works better.

[BubbleCat]

AFAIK there is different grades of essential oils, those suitable for inhalation are not the same as they that are used for massages and such.
Personally I dont believe in there being a big different but it shouldnt hurt to make sure you get the right one for your experiment.
You could also try to go with actual lavender, rub it on and see what happens when you go to the swamps on a hot summer night

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[The Clam]

While is is not an essential oil, nicotine will repel/ kill just about any insect you could want.  As well as your roses.     And don't get any on you or your pets.  Otherwise, nicotine is an amazing insecticide and a perfect reason to grow tobacco.  Always go for nicotina rustica, as it has a fairly high nicotine content.

Now back to your previously scheduled programming.

Tobacco you grow is awesome but tobacco bought often has plant pathogens onboard so its defiantly something to consider if you plan on growing anything in the nightshade family (peppers, tobacco, tomato, potato, datura, ect)

[LIBERTYNY]

 If your not carefull with the tobacco it can kill you as well

green tobacco disease  -  harvesters often comedown with this thru skin contact,  If you dont smoke/chew it does not take much
 

[Mangrove]

Which chemicals/essential-oils would be harmless to plants, linger around for days or weeks after administration, and kill or ward-off (preferably the former) parasites, mold/fungi, creepy-crawlies, and cats? A local feral cat and raccoon in my neighborhood has developed a very annoying/destructive habit of nibbling-away at my novo, psychotria, caapi, Leonotis Leonurus, and kratom leaves on a semi-regular basis, and tend to make a complete fucking mess out of my garden (tips-over pots, nibbles-off sections of cacti which oftentimes get infected with fungi there afterwards, loves to drop-off baked goods full of tape worm all over my venus fly trap, murders unattended seedlings, etc.) every single time they pay it a visit, which amounts to somewhere around a few times a month. I'm getting pissed-the-hell-off at this little pussy's games, and, in the style of his unholiness, Edgar Allen Poe, hereby swear a vow of liquid-nitrogen-cold revenge upon these feline menace(s). I have posted a previous rant about the last cat attack, but that issue seemed to dissipate after her last visit, in which that poor pussy was probably pulverized after nibbling-off two salvia leaves way too many on it's last expedition...

I'm getting desperate, here, plants are being mutilated left and bright by pussies and I am in desperate need of effective repellants (preferably lethal to animals but safe for plant use and human contact). I am considering bringing in a few daturas or brugmansias in order to teach them not to trespass upon my garden forevermore; I am also considering spraying-down leaves of interest with an aqueous nicotine solution such that lower life forms would self-destruct, and possibly exhibit a negative affective response from felines due to nicotine toxicity; perhaps a layer of neem can diminish taste and induce negative reinforcement, thus deterring likeliness of stealing any further leaves from me; perhaps adding ferns known to accumulate fatal concentrations of arsenic/toxic heavy metals from soil medium would work as a Darwin test of sorts as they would learn not to chew ferns around precious plants by dying from the poisonous plants surrounding them, thus suggesting to communities not to play with my fire.

Does anyone else have experience with dealing with feline infestations, as well as methods of repelling/killing said pests from my precious plants? THis situation is getting out of hand way fast way too serious; any and all advice regarding "organic" and/or effective remedies regarding my sticky situation would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
-Mangrove

PS, would aqueous cyanide salts (in very low concentrations) administered to soil solution and re-uptaken by plant help ward-off pests due to increased cyanide concentration in plant, or would this just kill the plant and/or not harm the pests at all? Would like to know as I'm getting pissed the frog off at this issue, and am hell-bent on ridding myself of this pestillence plaguing my precious plants.

[LIBERTYNY]

Cats love antifreeze, theirs also golden marlin is some vicious OTC stuff

On a more tame note theirs traps legholds/haveahearts and bodygrip traps which are not expensive, Peadar urine works for quite a while

 My aunts neighbors have a half breed savanna cat, that is a cat eating machine, seriously these things are predators

 theirs also these red blinking eye things that work well for a while  "Interplex Solar Nite Eyes Predator Protection " 

1 Like Mangrove likes this.

[ONandONandON]

What is wrong withthese people? Wow. Hot pepper spray on leaves for cats. Psycho.

1 Like Mangrove likes this.