Topic: Soft Soap???

[katynewbie]

???

Just been watching my new dvd of "The Victorian Kitchen Garden" loved it when it was on TV and still love it now! Harry uses gloopy stuff called "soft soap" as an anti-bug measure. What is it? Is it organic? Where can you get it? Anyone tried it?

[tim]

"Insecticidal soap"? Seems to help.

Organic Catalogue.

[Petra]

When I was a nurse in the early eighties we used a green gloopy soft soap for enema's, not sure if that's the same stuff though!!
My grandmother used to save all the soapy water from her old twin tub washer to spray over the roses as she reckoned it prtected them from all sorts of pests

[Robert_Brenchley]

Any soap will kill insects as it attacks the wax coating on the cuticle. Be careful of what you're adding with the soap though.

[jennym]

Phostrogen Safer's Garden Insecticide Concentrate andB & Q Bug Free Concentrate
are similar products, containing fatty acids. These are approved for use by amateur growers i.e. those without a pesticide licence. I believe that Savona is restricted to professional use, i.e. licence holders only.

[katynewbie]

;D

Thanks folks, will investigate!!

 ;)

[supersprout]

Snap katie, I got the VCG CD and had forgotten it was so good.

My mum used to buy soft soap in a small jar from Boots the Chemist. Ever since I can remember it was referred to in organic gardening books, so I always assumed it WAS organic. It was green and gloopy. We used it for all household cleaning (not for clothes) and for greenfly spray for the roses and broad beans. Once when I went on a hot date at age 11 I used it on my face for extra polish :-[

My mum used to say it wasn't the soft soap that killed the greenfly, but the water. She said they had tiny holes in their skin, which water didn't get through because of the surface tension. She told me that you needed very little soft soap to destroy the surface tension of the water, so the water went through the greenflies' skin and drownded them. Was that soft soap?
 ::)

Boots seem to have given up being chemists, does anyone remember getting copper sulphate crystals there and growing a waterglass garden? Might be worth a try @Boots or at an old fashioned chemist's. If not, http://www.bio.scarletts.co.uk/html/Soft_Soap.html although it's heavy so buying local would seem to make sense.

[Robert_Brenchley]

I remember water glass well, and alum crystals, and borax for curing animal skins, but I nicked my copper sulphate from the chemistry lab at school.

[Travman]

My mum used to say it wasn't the soft soap that killed the greenfly, but the water. She said they had tiny holes in their skin, which water didn't get through because of the surface tension. She told me that you needed very little soft soap to destroy the surface tension of the water, so the water went through the greenflies' skin and drownded them.

I like this idea/theory
but I wonder.......
Is this true ??
Anybody with any comments?

[jennym]

I check my plants regularly, and as soon as I see the first signs, just a few,  I blast them off with water sprays. I find this works very well, no chemicals needed BUT you have to get them early, and repeat whenever you see them.

[Robert_Brenchley]

Water sprays will kill a lot of insects, but soap makes it that bit more certain.

[djbrenton]

I use Chempak soft soap which is formulated for use in the garden.. It also helps the take up of foliar feeds.

[katynewbie]

;D

As has been said before on this site...the plot thickens!!!

[Gardenantics]

Soft soap is also used in pottery to seal plaster moulds so you can release them when you have finished making the production mould, and I have an old pot of it in front of me now.

Makers;
Battle, Hayward & Bower Ltd.
Crofton Drive
Lincoln.

Now I have had this for years, so no telling if they are still trading, but it works well for me on greenfly etc. It smells organic!

Brian