All good advice and the hydro store makes $$ on what they sell.
fyi, The helpful people at the hydro store can sell you SNS products rather than IC3 or a DIY essential oil blend and then help themselves to more $$.
So if you want (or anyone else) to save some $$, here is a breakdown of the ingredients in a few products.
comparison of the ingredients:
SNS-203
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ic3 insecticide is
ACTIVE INGREDIENTS
% COMPOSITION
Rosemary Oil
10.0
Geraniol
5.0
Peppermint Oil
2.0
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Best bang for the buck, due to % of oils, looks to be the build a soil essential oil blend.
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6 oil blend. $45.00 for 8 oz.
http://buildasoil.com/products/essential-oil-blend
This 8 Ounce Bottle of oil will mix with water to make about 16 Gallons of foliar spray.
Compare to over $50 per gallon with the other products on the market.
27.77% Rosemary Oil - Camphor Type - Spain (a-pinene: 27.5%, Camphene: 12.9%, Mircene: 4.0%, Limonene: 3.4%, 1.8-Cineol: 15.8%, Camphor: 18.1%, Linalool: 0.6%)
27.77% Eucalyptus Oil - Blue Malle - Australia (1,8-Cineole % (m/m): 92.17, a-Pinene % (m/m): 1.44, b-Pinene % (m/m): 0.83, Sabinene % (m/m): 0.10, a-Phellandrene % (m/m): 0.09, Limonene % (m/m): 1.26)
27.77% Lemongrass oil - India (myrcene, citronellal, geranyl acetate, nerol, geraniol, neral and traces of limonene and citral)
5.55% Thyme - Red Thymol - Spain (a-thujone, a-pinene, camphene, b-pinene, p-cymene, a-terpinene, linalool, borneol, b-caryophyllene, thymol and carvacrol.)
5.55% Clove - Stem - Madagascar (Eugenol...........94.73, Beta-
caryophyllene...3.63%, Acetate d'eugenyle....0.78%)
5.55% Ginger - India (Ginger is high in Citral along with 477 other constituents)
When choosing the blend I went with the oils most often mentioned for potency with Mites, Mildews, Molds and our General Purposes for Indoor Gardening. Out of the list of possible oils I also chose the most affordable oils over the most expensive so long as the reports indicate they were equally effective for our use. Once I found the most potent and economical oils, I then took the selection a step further and chose the region and type of oil that was highest in the particular constituents we were after. For instance, Clove Oil could be from several regions and also from different parts of the plant. I chose Clove Stem because it showed the highest amount of Eugenol of the other varieties of clove oil.
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sm-90 contains sulfur in the oils. coriander, canola oil.
(Not positive but the triethanolamine may be to help the oils and water mix, due to the sulphur content)
OIL OF CORIANDER 1% CAS Number: 8008-52-4
MODIFIED CANOLA OIL 3% CAS Number: N/A
TRIETHANOLAMINE 5% CAS Number: 102-71-6
I got all the % from the MSDS of each product.
Hope that helps save some $$.
