airtight storage how?

[Miguel de Salas]

In article <Pine.GSO.3.95q.981013011502.9886A-100000 at iquest7>,
lday at iquest.net wrote:

> On Tue, 13 Oct 1998, Miguel de Salas wrote:
> 
> > I have read that specimens killed with nicotine remain free of pests
> > virtually for ever. 
> 
> How in the world would you kill a bug with nicotine?  Force it to smoke a
> tiny cigarette?
> 

Well, no, unless you can persuade it to smoke :)

You buy nicotine from some stores (at least, you used to be able to),
which is used as a 'natural' insecticide. You dip a pin in nicotine and
let it dry. When you catch a lep, you stab it with the nicotine-soaked
pin, and it dies quite fast. You can also keep a small bottle with cotton
soaked in nicotine, and keep the pin inserted in the cotton, ready to use
when needed.
Additionally, the insect stays quite lethargic and does not move in the
interval between when you stick the pin in and the time it dies. My
reference says insects killed this way stay free of pests for a very long
time. 
It also says an alternative way to make the nicotine concentrate is to buy
bulk tobacco, boiling it, and concentrating the extract by evaporation.
Added advantages are that some 'bombycids' and actiids lay up their full
complement of eggs when stabbed, and rigor mortis doesn't set in.
Disadvantages are that freshly emerged adults may lose a lot of fluid that
should be removed with blotting paper or a blade of grass, and nicotine
can leave marks on the wings if it touches them, so you have to be
careful.
Cheers

-- 
Miguel de Salas,

mm_de at postoffice.utas.edu.au

School of Pland Science
University of Tasmania, Australia