Mosquitoes and a tree/plant (una mata) which keeps them off(?)

[J D Sauser]

I just recently overheard talk about some kind of plant/tree/shrub (mata de...) which supposedly keeps flying insects like mosquitoes off, but couldn't get the name of the particular plant. Somehow however, I got the funny feeling of having read about that somewhere one or two years ago. Was it here? I searched but to no avail.

Anybody knows or remembers?

... J-D.

[Chip]

That would be nice, but the ultimate thing is this machine that was posted somewhere here on DR1 that kills mosquitos by the thousands over a half acre and uses no chemicals. That is certainly on my checklist whenever I have enough money.

[leekiv]

That would be nice, but the ultimate thing is this machine that was posted somewhere here on DR1 that kills mosquitos by the thousands over a half acre and uses no chemicals. That is certainly on my checklist whenever I have enough money.

Mosquito Magnet

Hope it works. Just ordered one a week ago.

[LindseyKaufman]

I don't know the name of the tree/bush here, but in West Africa where I have property, it is called a nim tree. It is a natural mosquito repellent. The Ghanaians would use the wood from the tree to "brush" their teeth. Others would swallow a leaf. Although it is very bitter, doing so was a natural mosquito repellent and prevented malaria.

I will try to contact some of my friends there who might know the latin derivative of the name. I don't know if that will help with the Spanish name or even the name of the tree here in the DR.

Oh. And just now, my gardener told me that that this tree IS in the DR. He doesn't know the name, but will find out for me and tell me tomorrow, if no one else on dr1 knows it in the meantime.

Lindsey

[LindseyKaufman]

Here is a link with information. (My gardener says that the name is different here.)

Jamun or Nim Tree

Lindsey

[John Evans]

a lot of plants work by means of crushing them to release the scent which disguises the smell of humans- /pelegonium/lemonbalm/lemongrass/marigolds/lavender/cederwood and a lot of herbs but only effective when crushed...

[LindseyKaufman]

Here is one more link for the nim tree that explains all the medicinal value.

TopTropicals.com - rare plants for home and garden

Lindsey

[Chris]

More commonly known as a Neem Tree.
Here is some interesting tree information from an old thread.
Names for trees

[A.Hidalgo]

Read about the neem tree but nothing about keeping mosquitoes away....

Neem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[LindseyKaufman]

I reviewed several articles about the nim tree. No, it does not repel insects. Instead, it acts as a natural insecticide.

This is the information derived from this link

Revista Envío - "NIM": Nature's Own Insecticide

A Three Pronged Attack
The nim is a complete insecticide. The active substance is present in the whole tree, but is concentrated in the seeds. The nim's insecticide is very complex and acts simultaneously in three directions against damaging crop eating insects.

As a repellent, the nim serves to drive away certain insects. But this is not its most important function.

The nim is also a phagodeterrent: it arrests the growth of damaging insects. Insects eat plants treated by the nim insecticide, and even appear to find them more appetizing. But at a certain point in their digestive process, the insects, still at the voracious larva stage, begin to eat less and less, until they stop eating and die, before reaching sexual maturity. The damage caused to the crops by what the insects did eat can be viewed as an investment to reduce the pest population in future generations.

The third and most interesting form of the insecticide's actions is its attack on the damaging insect's hormonal system. The insect develops perfectly throughout all of its stages, apparently unaffected. The problems begin with breeding. It simply cannot. Small physical malformations prevent it; a wing that did not grow correctly, a longer or shorter leg, lack of sexual appetite, sterility. With no breeding, there are no baby insects, and the damaging insect population is reduced from generation to generation.

The nim's active ingredient is azadirachtina, whose chemical composition is so complex that the most sophisticated chemical laboratories have not been able to synthetically produce it, although research has been going on for a number of years.

Hope this clears things up without getting too complicated.

Lindsey