Kitchen Garden Forum

I'll start a new thread with this one, rather than confusing the creosote debate even further.

Last night I was browsing through an old gardening book (Richard Sudell, Practical Gardening and Food Production, Odhams Press, 1942). Among the remedies suggested for various pests and diseases of vegetables were:

Nicotine
Paris Green
Naphthalene
Mercuric Chloride
Creosote (on onions!)
Lead Arsenate
White lead paint
Formalin
Quicklime

I haven't checked the availability, legality or toxicity of any of the above. I just offer the list as a spur for comment, as these were suggested as remedies amateurs should use.

Alan

You just can't beat the old ways of doing things.

Never did me any harm...

I'm fine too.....

Grew up with most of those added...

Actually, I have a great recipe for onion and creosote gravy... and everyone knows the fortifying effect of quick naphthalene sandwich.

I try to stay away from Paris Green, but she seems to be on telly endlessly!

Oh how droll!
Of all the chemicals mentioned by Alan only Nicotine is still legally available to ANY grower.
JB.

Sadly, the propagation of nicotine, in one of its natural forms is still a big money spinner (indirectly) for the government/s. I wonder why they haven't banned it?

I know i'm going off the original subject, as i normally do, but when i was reading the exceptionally good issue of the Kithchen Garden magazine, i saw in next months issue Bob Flowerdew is doing a bit on cultivating tabacco for your own cigarettes.
Whats that all about Captain Carrot.

Well, it's banned here in Wales from 1st April But my neighbour's still using creosote and most of the local drivers are still speeding on narrow country lanes while using their mobile phones ... ond dyna fo that's life

Well it may surprise you but I thought that the fitness and health of the conscripted population according to the armed services was at a much higher level in the 1940s than it is today.
Perhaps they knew something the modern Nanny State doesn’t.

Barney

No, Barney, it doesn't surprise me. Are you suggesting this was due to the full list of chemicals, or just nicotine (yes, I am a smoker still).
They were smaller and thinner. I just have to think back to my family. Those of us born and/or raised in the forties ended up bigger (and fitter ) on a healthy diet of orange juice, cod-liver oil, rose-hip syrup and dig-your-own vegetables. And the wartime government was far, far more a "Nanny State" than now.

Alan

Is that right Barney? Not doubting you but just wondering if you know more about it. I remember hearing something about the health of 1st World War soldiers, that it was quite bad - I think the average chest measurement was something like 30 inches.

I spent my war-time summer holidays on a farm in Czechoslovakia stringing tobacco leaves with large needles. They were then hung up to dry in the barn! I remember the smell as being very pleasant, but, luckily, I never took to the taste and didn't start smoking or snorting!

Hi Jenny

I don’t know about the First World War Jenny but I had heard that modern recruits were not in such good condition as the Second WW ones.

All I can think is that perhaps the First WW recruits were deprived of the benefits of eating all those 1940s’ chemical foods!!! (But then I would wouldn’t I?)

Barney