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In East Africa, the mature pyrethrum flowers are picked by hand, sun dried to remove moisture, and sent to a processing plant for extraction of the active ingredient - pyrethrins, a mixture of six closely related esters.
In Australia, the flowers have been bred to synchronously flower so they can be mechanically harvested. As in Africa, the flowers are sun dried and processed to extract the insecticide pyrethrum.
Pyrethrum is an ancient insecticide.
The insecticide properties of the flowers were documented in the early 1800's but it is suspected that the flowers were used to kill insects a considerable time earlier.
The first commercially available products were powders made from ground flowers and later crude oil extractions became popular. Today, the refining of crude pyrethrum extract to remove the plant material such as waxes, is a highly complex process resulting in a very high grade product.
Pyrethrum degrades rapidly in the environment
Pyrethrum has been used effectively to control insects for decades and is non-persistent, decomposing rapidly in the environment. This rapid degradation of pyrethrum has resulted in little known cases of insect resistance, making it an excellent choice for the control of agricultural pests.
Pyrethrum is the active ingredient in Scotts® Defender™ Pyrethrum Insect Spray.
Pyrethrum - a low toxicity insecticide option