Did you know that many bugs can’t stand tobacco juice? In fact, nicotine a fast acting nerve toxin in insects and mammals. If you see whiteflies, gnats, aphids, thrips or leafminers, try using tobacco spray to get rid of them.
How to Make Steeped Tobacco Bug Repellent
Here’s a simple way to prove this in your garden: take a plug or wad of chewing tobacco (which can be purchased at most grocery stores), stick it in a nylon stocking, and boil it. You’ll end up with a fragrant dark brown juice containing loads of nicotine and other natural chemicals that function as broad spectrum insecticides.
But that’s not all there is to this solution: it needs a bit more to make it truly effective. As with most natural insecticide mixes, you’ll need to mix it into a soapy base to get it to stick to the plants. So make yourself a Fels Naphtha Soap solution by boiling a whole bar in a stocking, and mix that with two cups of tobacco juice and one cup of any antiseptic mouthwash. The mouthwash will irritate and/or desiccate any bugs that try to chow down on your plants.
Decant the mixture into a large hose-end sprayer, and spray to your heart’s content. Just remember that you’ll need to reapply the solution every ten days or so or after any significant rain; otherwise, the bugs will come back.
Want to learn more about less toxic insecticides and natural repellents?
Here are some websites that are helpful:
Less Toxic Insecticides from Clemson Cooperative Extension
How to Use Tobacco Juice to Control Pest in the Garden: Here’s how to make a tobacco spray with cigarette butts.
Botanical Insecticides from Texas A&M University’s Department of Entomology
can eating tobacco also be used for this purpose of insecticide in same way
But my grandfather used it to worm cows and horses.
How about for people and ticks.
Will the nicotine kill fish on a decorative pond. Goldfish and koi
What do you if the bugs start smoking?
make them smoke the whole bottle of mixture, it will either kill them or make them so sick they will never smoke it again.
What do you do if the bugs start smoking?
It’ll just be a slower and more painful death.
Do you have to use Naptha soap? Wouldn’t any type of soap work mixed in the tobacco juice?
All that is required is a surfactant I use polysorbate 20 which makes the water wetter by eliminating the surface tension and forms an emulsifier. Washing up liquid can also be used. I have used the tobacco juice as well in the formula. It is very effective and safe.
I use 1/3 part tobacco juice, 1/3 lemon liquid dish soap, 1/3 mint mouthwash. Pour into garden sprayer. Works very well.
Thanks for this. I’m going to try it because our pears are going to be ready next month
Would that affect bees?
The bees have already pollinated, this would be best suited to fruit trees, and vegetable gardens I think.
Can I mix Cayenne pepper with the spray to deter squirrels from digging up my flowers?
Yes. It deters cats as well, but must be reapplied after rain or watering.
That’s not enough tobacco. And boiling is not necessary. Best method: buy a pack of 20 cigarettes or the equivalent in chewing or rolling tobacco, the cheaper the better. Can also grown own tobacco for this purpose (burley, sylvestris, virginia etc.) Put the baccy from ALL 20 cigarettes in a jamjar filled 3/4 with water. After 2 days (it should look like black coffee) filter it thru a tea strainer and add one drop of washing up liquid. Spray that undiluted. Avoid flowering plants, you don’t want to kill bees and other beneficial insects. Also avoid plants within a month of harvest, you don’t want to poison yourself. Kills aphids dead.
So I spray it on tomatoes tress and all vegetable in garden the ants are in the clay garden they eating leafs of plants.
You could mix the tobacco juice with marijuana. The bugs will die, but they just won’t care.
I used actual tobacco leaves some years ago, but used a blender to puree the mixture. The problem was that I couldn’t get the tobacco juice flavor out of the glass blender. Not sure if it infused the glass or the rubber fittings.
Try cleaning with vinegar and a few drops of dawn.
Does this work on bedbugs
It will stain most fabrics. Get a steamer for bed bugs that reaches at least 220° F and they and their eggs will die.
Can I use fresh tobacco leaves to make the insecticide I have grown too many plants to smoke it all!
that sort of insecticide is what is killing the bees. Nicotinoids. So, you’ll kill the polinators but at least it’s “natural” poison? Great! Same results as man-made poison. How smart is that? Not very
You numpty! It kills the insects ON the plant and DETERS other insects, so bees won’t come near the stuff. This man-made poison is “natural” because it denatures quickly and does not pollute the groundwater. Get educated.