|
Pesticide
Pesticides are substances that are meant to control pests. This includes herbicide, insecticide, nematicide, molluscicide, piscicide, avicide, rodenticide, bactericide, insect repellent, animal repellent, microbicide, fungicide, and lampricide. The most common of these are herbicides which account for approximately 80% of all pesticide use. Most pesticides are intended to serve as plant protection products (also known as crop protection products), which in general, protect plants from weeds, fungi, or insects. As an example, the fungus '' Alternaria solani'' is used to combat the aquatic weed '' Salvinia''. In general, a pesticide is a chemical (such as carbamate) or biological agent (such as a virus, bacterium, or fungus) that deters, incapacitates, kills, or otherwise discourages pests. Target pests can include insects, plant pathogens, weeds, molluscs, birds, mammals, fish, nematodes (roundworms), and microbes that destroy property, cause nuisance, or spread ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pest Control
Pest control is the regulation or management of a species defined as a pest; any animal, plant or fungus that impacts adversely on human activities or environment. The human response depends on the importance of the damage done and will range from tolerance, through deterrence and management, to attempts to completely eradicate the pest. Pest control measures may be performed as part of an integrated pest management strategy. In agriculture, pests are kept at bay by mechanical, cultural, chemical and biological means. Ploughing and cultivation of the soil before sowing mitigate the pest burden, and crop rotation helps to reduce the build-up of a certain pest species. Concern about environment means limiting the use of pesticides in favour of other methods. This can be achieved by monitoring the crop, only applying pesticides when necessary, and by growing varieties and crops which are resistant to pests. Where possible, biological means are used, encouraging the natural enem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insecticide
Insecticides are substances used to kill insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against insect eggs and larvae, respectively. Insecticides are used in agriculture, medicine, industry and by consumers. Insecticides are claimed to be a major factor behind the increase in the 20th-century's agricultural productivity. Nearly all insecticides have the potential to significantly alter ecosystems; many are toxic to humans and/or animals; some become concentrated as they spread along the food chain. Insecticides can be classified into two major groups: systemic insecticides, which have residual or long term activity; and contact insecticides, which have no residual activity. The mode of action describes how the pesticide kills or inactivates a pest. It provides another way of classifying insecticides. Mode of action can be important in understanding whether an insecticide will be toxic to unrelated species, such as fish, birds and mammals. Insecticides may be repellen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herbicide
Herbicides (, ), also commonly known as weedkillers, are substances used to control undesired plants, also known as weeds.EPA. February 201Pesticides Industry. Sales and Usage 2006 and 2007: Market Estimates. Summary in press releasMain page for EPA reports on pesticide use ihere Selective herbicides control specific weed species, while leaving the desired crop relatively unharmed, while non-selective herbicides (sometimes called total weedkillers in commercial products) can be used to clear waste ground, industrial and construction sites, railways and railway embankments as they kill all plant material with which they come into contact. Apart from selective/non-selective, other important distinctions include ''persistence'' (also known as ''residual action'': how long the product stays in place and remains active), ''means of uptake'' (whether it is absorbed by above-ground foliage only, through the roots, or by other means), and ''mechanism of action'' (how it works). Historic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Environmental Protection Agency
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent executive agency of the United States federal government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on December 2, 1970, after Nixon signed an executive order. The order establishing the EPA was ratified by committee hearings in the House and Senate. The agency is led by its administrator, who is appointed by the president and approved by the Senate. The current administrator is Michael S. Regan. The EPA is not a Cabinet department, but the administrator is normally given cabinet rank. The EPA has its headquarters in Washington, D.C., regional offices for each of the agency's ten regions and 27 laboratories. The agency conducts environmental assessment, research, and education. It has the responsibility of maintaining and enforcing national standards under a variety of environmental laws, in consultation with sta ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pest (organism)
A pest is any animal or plant harmful to humans or human concerns. The term is particularly used for creatures that damage crops, livestock, and forestry or cause a nuisance to people, especially in their homes. Humans have modified the environment for their own purposes and are intolerant of other creatures occupying the same space when their activities impact adversely on human objectives. Thus, an elephant is unobjectionable in its natural habitat but a pest when it tramples crops. Some animals are disliked because they bite or sting; snakes, wasps, ants, bed bugs, fleas and ticks belong in this category. Others enter the home; these include houseflies, which land on and contaminate food, beetles, which tunnel into the woodwork, and other animals that scuttle about on the floor at night, like cockroaches, which are often associated with unsanitary conditions. Agricultural and horticultural crops are attacked by a wide variety of pests, the most important being insects, mit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Microbicide
An antimicrobial is an agent that kills microorganisms or stops their growth. Antimicrobial medicines can be grouped according to the microorganisms they act primarily against. For example, antibiotics are used against bacteria, and antifungals are used against fungi. They can also be classified according to their function. Agents that kill microbes are microbicides, while those that merely inhibit their growth are called bacteriostatic agents. The use of antimicrobial medicines to treat infection is known as antimicrobial chemotherapy, while the use of antimicrobial medicines to prevent infection is known as antimicrobial prophylaxis. The main classes of antimicrobial agents are disinfectants (non-selective agents, such as bleach), which kill a wide range of microbes on non-living surfaces to prevent the spread of illness, antiseptics (which are applied to living tissue and help reduce infection during surgery), and antibiotics (which destroy microorganisms within the body) ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Molluscicide
Molluscicides () – also known as snail baits, snail pellets, or slug pellets – are pesticides against molluscs, which are usually used in agriculture or gardening, in order to control gastropod pests specifically slugs and snails which damage crops or other valued plants by feeding on them. A number of chemicals can be employed as a molluscicide: * Metal salts such as iron(III) phosphate, aluminium sulfate, and ferric sodium EDTA, relatively non-toxic, also used in organic gardening * Metaldehyde * Niclosamide * Acetylcholinesterase inhibitors (e.g. methiocarb), highly toxic to other animals and humans, acts also as a contact poison Accidental poisonings Metal salt-based molluscicides are not toxic to higher animals. However, metaldehyde-based and especially acetylcholinesterase inhibitor-based products are highly toxic, and have resulted in many deaths of pets and humans. Some products contain a bittering agent that reduces but does not eliminate the risk of accid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cropduster Spraying Pesticides
Aerial application, or what is informally referred to as crop dusting, involves spraying crops with crop protection products from an agricultural aircraft. Planting certain types of seed are also included in aerial application. The specific spreading of fertilizer is also known as '' aerial topdressing ''in some countries. Many countries have severely limited aerial application of pesticides and other products because of environmental and public health hazards like spray drift; most notably, the European Union banned it outright with a few highly restricted exceptions in 2009, effectively ending the practice in all member states. Agricultural aircraft are highly specialized, purpose-built aircraft. Today's agricultural aircraft are often powered by turbine engines of up to and can carry as much as of crop protection product. Helicopters are sometimes used, and some aircraft serve double duty as water bombers in areas prone to wildfires. These aircraft are referred to as SE ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rodenticide
Rodenticides are chemicals made and sold for the purpose of killing rodents. While commonly referred to as "rat poison", rodenticides are also used to kill mice, squirrels, woodchucks, chipmunks, porcupines, nutria, beavers, and voles. Despite the crucial roles that rodents play in nature, there are times when they need to be controlled. Some rodenticides are lethal after one exposure while others require more than one. Rodents are disinclined to gorge on an unknown food (perhaps reflecting an adaptation to their inability to vomit), preferring to sample, wait and observe whether it makes them or other rats sick. This phenomenon of poison shyness is the rationale for poisons that kill only after multiple doses. Besides being directly toxic to the mammals that ingest them, including dogs, cats, and humans, many rodenticides present a secondary poisoning risk to animals that hunt or scavenge the dead corpses of rats. Classes of rodenticides Anticoagulants Anticoagulant ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insect Repellent
An insect repellent (also commonly called "bug spray") is a substance applied to skin, clothing, or other surfaces to discourage insects (and arthropods in general) from landing or climbing on that surface. Insect repellents help prevent and control the outbreak of insect-borne (and other arthropod-bourne) diseases such as malaria, Lyme disease, dengue fever, bubonic plague, river blindness, and West Nile fever. Pest animals commonly serving as vectors for disease include insects such as flea, fly, and mosquito; and ticks (arachnids). Some insect repellents are insecticides (bug killers), but most simply discourage insects and send them flying or crawling away. Nearly any would be fatal upon reaching the median lethal dose, but classification as an insecticide implies death even at lower doses. Effectiveness Synthetic repellents tend to be more effective and/or longer lasting than "natural" repellents. For protection against mosquito bites, the U.S. Centers for Disease C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fungicide
Fungicides are biocidal chemical compounds or biological organisms used to kill parasitic fungi or their spores. A fungistatic inhibits their growth. Fungi can cause serious damage in agriculture, resulting in critical losses of yield, quality, and profit. Fungicides are used both in agriculture and to fight fungal infections in animals. Chemicals used to control oomycetes, which are not fungi, are also referred to as fungicides, as oomycetes use the same mechanisms as fungi to infect plants. Fungicides can either be contact, translaminar or systemic. Contact fungicides are not taken up into the plant tissue and protect only the plant where the spray is deposited. Translaminar fungicides redistribute the fungicide from the upper, sprayed leaf surface to the lower, unsprayed surface. Systemic fungicides are taken up and redistributed through the xylem vessels. Few fungicides move to all parts of a plant. Some are locally systemic, and some move upwardly. Most fungicides that ca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bacterium
Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were among the first life forms to appear on Earth, and are present in most of its habitats. Bacteria inhabit soil, water, acidic hot springs, radioactive waste, and the deep biosphere of Earth's crust. Bacteria are vital in many stages of the nutrient cycle by recycling nutrients such as the fixation of nitrogen from the atmosphere. The nutrient cycle includes the decomposition of dead bodies; bacteria are responsible for the putrefaction stage in this process. In the biological communities surrounding hydrothermal vents and cold seeps, extremophile bacteria provide the nutrients needed to sustain life by converting dissolved compounds, such as hydrogen sulphide and methane, to energy. Bacteria also live in symbiotic and parasitic rela ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
