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Nuke ‘Em: Scary Name for a Safe Product

Over the next several months, in compliance with LCB regulations, more and more producers will be listing the products they use to combat pests right on the package. Some of these pesticides have some pretty intense names, but at Dockside, we’re here to quell those fears.

 

Nuke ’em is non-toxic, with food-grade ingredients and breaks down like this:

 

Ingredients: Citric Acid (Solution .05%), Potassium Sorbate, Yeast Enzymes
Other Ingredients: Water

-Citric acid is in a lot of candy and many, many other edible products. Citric Acid is what makes sour candy sour and bath bombs fizzy.  You can buy it in bulk, and in fact my weirdo boyfriend has a bag of citric acid at home. He licks a finger, dips it in, and then licks his finger again. It’s gross for a lot of reasons, but it’s perfectly safe. If he were an insect, though, it’d be a different story.

-Potassium Sorbate is in a lot of food we eat too — wine, yogurt, cheese, McDonald’s shakes, apple cider. It’s not something you should eat a whole lot of but the government thinks it’s fine for you to eat about 1500mg in a sitting, which you would be hard pressed to find!

-Yeast – It’s yeast. C’mon now.
 
Strategy
The yeast and citric acid increase the permeability of insect and mold bodies to the potassium sorbate, which floods into the bodies of the affected pests and kills them.
It’s simple, safe for human contact, and moderately effective for leaf-eating insects and certain kinds of mold and powdery mildew.
 
Why Are They Calling Such A Safe Agent Such a Violent Name?
Because these pesticides are marketed at farmers, and apparently farmers buy the brands that sound effective more readily than the brands which sound safe. The makers of Nuke ’em probably never imagined consumers would be exposed to their brand.

 

Thanks for reading! That’s your little piece of peace of mind for the day!