Insecticides

Considered as an agent to control insects, insecticides are chemical based or of biological origin—this control can be total destruction to its death, or to prevent it from destructive behavior. It can also be natural or manmade, and of many different style for application --as a spray, a bait, or slow-release diffusion.

In recent years, research and studies have discovered the correlation between illness, disease, and the use of insecticides. It has also been discovered that they have the potential to alter our ecosystems and are considered highly toxic to humans through the food chain doorways. Many have been banned due to these adverse affects against children, adults, and animals. There are several ways to classify insecticides—systemic insecticides, contact insecticides, inorganic insecticides, and organic insecticides.

Systemic insecticides are the process where there is an incorporation of the insecticides through treating specific plants in a specific location. The insects then eat the treated plant, become ill, and die. The thing to watch for is that many insects eventually develop immunity to the poison, which is becoming more and more common. Another type of classification of insecticides is the contact insecticide. This included nicotine and pyrethrum, which is a product made by plants as a natural defense against insects. Marigolds planted around the perimeter of a garden have been a long-time standby to repel insects, and pyrethrum is a product made from this flower.

Insecticides fall into two classifications—inorganic and organic. The difference lies in the fact that organic molecules contain carbon at all times, and inorganic does not. Used, as we know it now, the term "insecticide" was first used about 130 years ago. But more primitive types of it were used thousands of years ago. But in the civilization sense it began in 1867, in the United States when they used paris green against the Colorado potato beetle, a poisonous emerald-green power used as an insecticide. Mixed with kerosene oil emulsion, it was used against chewing and sucking insects from then on.