Basically, pee on your plants and follow with a peroxide chaser?

I don't think we can discuss Golden Showers in open forum. Can we?

Do you know how they came up with a cure for toenail fungus? Divers peeing in their wetsuits.

I would tend to think that by the time one realizes that there is a problem it is already too late. Just using a supposed cure-all or other mitigant is not the answer to the failure to develop an adequate culture for any plant based upon a realistic routine of care and an observant ability to take whatever remedial steps are necessary at those times when expected procedures fail. The most important part of growing plants is interacting with them.
That does not come in a bottle or from a book or even from advice from this forum.

Hydrogen Peroxide is H2O2 if anybody cares (and I thought my college education was worthless). I can't imagine a hydrogen peroxide diluted to that degree having any effect. 3% straight from the bottle will kill bacteria during a repotting.

Laura - It's Tea Tree oil for toenail fungus. Just heard that on the radio yesterday. Dump it on your nail, cover with a cotton ball and tape and go to bed. No more nasty fungus. I love radio.

K

Howwwwward! Ladies present ;-)
Marketing has gotten pathetic. Put it in a bottle and call it something. The American way. I recently was sent a sample fertiliser "Twice as much kick as the original" Its 11-8-17. I wonder what the orginal formula is? 5-4-8? Wow! Impressive...not

Clara

Interesting comments.
Check out the H2O2: Peroxide Plant Perfection link at this webpage http://www.maximumyield.com/issue_v9n6.php

It might help...

Alex

I strongly suspect tea tree oil is diluted Neem oil. Equally effective on orchids and toe fungus in my experience. msflintlock

Our 99 yr old Orchid Society gru swears by this stuff. Says it is 100X better than Neem and will wipe out scale over-night.

Forgot to mention, I only used Peroxide 2 times in my life and it killed both plants. I don't know what I did wrong, but you won't ever catch me using it again. I poured it straight from the bottle through the plant. Burned the roots.

Jane

No sure if I would use hydrogen peroxide for plants, especially to curtain the side effects of overwatering..I think it is easier to not overwater.

I do have one use for hyrogen peroxide, I use it to drmatically add oxygen to O2-depleted pond water durring electrical outages and pump damage. For the chemists out there, H202 dissociates into H20 and 02 in the presence of light or water, or both; usually at low concentrations. fail to see the usefulness of high dose hydrogen peroxide in combating plant problems.

Brad- allegedly it "oxygenates" the roots.

Jane- It can burn thin leaved plants. I pour it too but I water the plant first, then pour it on the roots or water and wait until the next day for the h2o2 application. For leaf bacterial, I only apply it to the affected area of the leaf with a q-tip of cloth. Let it evaporate from the leaves out of the light or wipe it off. Once it's been in contact with the problem area, it's done it's thing. Kind of like a finger cut. Some folks mist it on

Clara

Teatree oil (from Melaleuca alternifolia) is most definitely NOT diluted Neem oil (from Azidrachta indica). I stupidly applied 100% teatree oil onto a phalaenopsis crown this summer and burnt the poor plant. Even a drop of tea tree on the foliage caused burn. Use it at your own peril. alvin

PS. Tidbit - Tea tree is apparently a favorite host plant for Dendrobium canaliculatum.

Did anyone hear the story a while ago about the use of Tea Tree oil causing breast enlargement in men or was it both men and women? In any case, men use at your own risk especially if you've been putting some time into developing great pecs.

K

From the standpoint of Human Health, most experts agree that 3% hydrogen peroxide, or H202 is pretty much a useless disinfectant when used on wounds, surgical or otherwise. It is however particularly well suited for killing some things commonly found in wounds, namely fibroblasts and white blood cells, both of which are rather important in wound healing. IMHO, I think the fizzing it what makes it seem like it is doing something beneficial, though as pointed out earlier many things can serve as a catalyst for the reaction. All you need is a little enzyme from the family known as catalase, an electron donor, oxygen and peroxide and viola water and O2. The reason it fizzes so in wounds, fresh or otherwise is red blood cells have an abundance of the enzymes that catalyze this reaction, as do many bacteria & plants. Peroxide itself is directly toxic to tissues, but is also generated through many vital cellular processes. Since it is bad for the cells, but made by them in the process of living it pays to have a means to dispose it quickly - hence the abundance & variety of catalase enzymes. Most aerobic (O2=happy) and some anaerobic (O2=sad) bacteria have these enzymes. By the way, Peroxide is particularly good at removing blood from fabric, but perhaps best when used to remove said stain from white fabric.

Another use of golden showers? This is unlikely to be news to our Australian brethren, the answer is of course at the beach! Urine deactivates the nematocyst of jellyfish quite effectively without triggering them to deploy their poison filled harpoons. I do not advocate volunteering this service to anyone you are not intimate with or related to by blood or by law. Also, it has been suggested that collecting the golden liquid in a suitable container prior to application is more socially, and in this particular case aesthetically acceptable. Certain other liquids work, but no sensible person takes them to the beach.

Aachenelf, I remember this! It was in a fairly recent issue of The New England Journal of Medicine reporting on breast development in boys using soaps or shampoo containing Lavender oil and Tea Tree oil. Both oils were found to have weak estrogen like properties, and the capacity to block male sex hormone function. This is horrid to admit, but I remember being shocked and a little bemused by this revelation and actually read a portion of the article aloud to my bedmate. I could not dispel the images of conversations along these lines "I love this shower gel, it smells wonderful, leaves my skin so soft, ANDÂ." Pre-pubertal boys with breast fixations do not benefit from growing a pair of their own, I am certain.

Back to the peroxide question. I have read about pouring peroxide into the unhappily rotting crown of Pahls, and about the curative properties for root rots. Knowing how weakly germicidal (at best) peroxide is I was a little suspicious about these claims. But, the hydroponics community seems to think it is some kind of miracle juice. What Howard suggests may be the greatest part of any benefit seen. While the peroxide at readily available concentrations is weakly germicidal at best, the liberation of modest amounts of oxygen by plant catalase may be more strongly toxic to anaerobic bacteria creating conditions unfavorable to their growth if not killing them outright. As you may know, in virtually any play in life the anaerobes are always cast as the villain, never the hero.

Peroxide is certainly cheap. If it is not outright harmful to the plant, who knows? If time permits I may have to do a search of botany databases to see if this has been looked at or if it is in the urban/folk legend category.

The above noted text and my fascination with these things is the very reason I do not get invited to many normal parties....

Then why did it kill my two Phals? It happened very quickly. It appeared to kill the roots. I'd be interested in comments on this if anyone has an idea.

Jane

rfraser - I just luv this stuff too and really appreciate it when people like yourself take the time to post these detailed explanations.

I have a feeling peroxide falls into the same category as alcohol. People generally recommend both as being totally safe to use on orchids, but maybe a bit more understanding of how they work and what else they might do to a plant is needed too.

K

"Then why did it kill my two Phals? It happened very quickly. It appeared to kill the roots. I'd be interested in comments on this if anyone has an idea"

Coincidence? Was it a bark mix? Was is dry? Personally I only use H2O2 (thanks Richard) in sphag, the good stuff that stays wet a long time or in dirt plants. When there is plenty of of water in suspension in the medium the peroxide does what it is intended to do but in a dryer mix it might do more damage to roots? This is conjecture but to you and the others that expressed misgivings about H202 I submit that your experiences run counter to what the majority of us experience. Life on the bottle can be good. Give it another try.

H

Well, who knew. The first hit when 'urea hydrogen peroxide' is put into the _______ search engine has this to say: "Urea-hydrogen peroxide is a non-toxic, odorless crystalline solid. This adduct, which contains 35% of H2O2, sets the hydrogen peroxide free during its application." So, it would appear that The Product is working with better than drugstore strength (3%) H2O2 to start with but after the recommended dilution what are we left with? Someone better in math than I can work it out. Or not. Miracle Gro it would appear add UHP to their ubiquitous 7-7-7 A.V. fert and Safers sells a 1-2-1 fert plus UHP called Oxygen Plus, also aimed at A.V. growers. What is this with all the catering to AV people? Seems a narrow focus. There's got to be something to it though. We've been missing out.

H

This got really long way too fast, and I did not even get to tell about my new Cycnoches chlorchilon! Oops! I did! It has just got a nubbins of a spike, and I think my rather confused Rhynchostylis gigantea is putting up a spike too. Very exciting times here in the north!

I did a little bit more reading too on line and much of the text espousing the wonders of H2O2 is from the hydroponic and aeroponic growers. I have given this some additional thought and have hit upon a theory of sorts. And more questions. A funny side note, many of the indoor growers that are using some very hi-tech and sophisticated systems and nutrient solutions are not growing Orchids, or fruits or veggies for consumption, but in fact are growing vegetable matter for combustion. It strikes me as funny that in my youth the persons most likely to indulge in this recreation were that last ones you might suspect as having the mental horsepower to put together these kinds of growing systems. Do not even ask about the plant genetics discussed in some forums, and one site had what looked to be a doctoral dissertation on the molecular biology of a very particular part of the plant, more specifically on the plants production of the compound that makes this plant an item of interest in the first place. I was fascinated and humbled, but will continue to grow orchids. As a final humorous note, several of my sons friends (college age) have seen my grow lights and set up and suggested that the orchids are just a cover for growing this particular "other" indoor crop. I digress.

Howard, the resources I saw suggest using only the 35% food grade H2O2, and diluting it to around 1%, and then using this 1% solution anywhere from 1 to several tsp per gallon of water. A ratio of 1 part 35% H2O2 to 11 parts water is alleged to yield about a 1% solution, but I have not checked the math on that. The reason for using the 35% food grade is that the typical 3% stuff from the market of pharmacy has several compounds added as stabilizers to prevent degradation of the H2O2 during storage that may theoretically reduce the availability of the H2O2 and may be outright bad for the plants. Modest quantities of food grade H2O2 are cheap, but make no mistake undiluted 35% H2O2 is a liquid to be treated with reverence.

Since this amount of a 1% solution added to a gallon of water makes a pretty thin soup it is not hard to see how undiluted 3% might be very hard (or deadly) on plant roots. I am betting the cuticle on leaves offers some margin of safety when 3% or less is applied to a crown or diseased plant tissue topside.

My speculation(s): The growing conditions the roots of hydroponically grown plants are in very different conditions than plants in soil, bark or other media. Semi hydro as it is often called is not really the same situation either as I see it. The hydro people are also using higher concentrations of H2O2 as washes to keep tanks hygienic, and some sites suggested that having low concentrations in the re-circulating solution might prolong its safe use by reducing the rate of growth of plant pathogens.

The roots of plants grown in soil or soil-less media have the potential for exposure to both helpful and harmful microorganisms. One bit of sand in the Vaseline for me is that H2O2 is as noted previously just a dumb bomb, killing in general as opposed to killing only the harmful organisms. In this light it could be helping on one hand but disturbing the balance of important microflora in the immediate root environment. So, if the benefit is in cleaning up the bad stuff (plant pathogens = bad stuff) at the root, it may give not a net gain if it is also killing off the good stuff too.

Now bear with me here, I am not being argumentative, that would be my 16 year old daughter, I am just thinking out loud and asking some questions.

The secondary hypothesis is that the release of oxygen near the root is itself helpful to the plant directly. What I am wondering is how the oxygen near the root is helpful to the plant? Roots are not primarily respiratory organs in most plants. Roots are important for absorption and transport of water and micronutrients, anchoring of the stem to the substrate, in some cases the storage of "food", and in more specialized cases active energy production through photosynthesis. We are for the time ignoring the "Ghost" orchid. In a non-photosynthetic root one could wonder what need it might have for oxygen at all.

Why then do we consider oxygen to be good to have around the roots? Also the role oxygen plays in plant physiology and "respiration" is quite different than how we think of oxygen and our breathing. In truth on a quantum level it could be argued that there is little difference in its function, but you would really be splitting hairs there. Plants both use oxygen and generate it as a byproduct. We think of them as "making" oxygen because at the end of the day the plant has made more oxygen than they have used while living.

Food for thought is all, just food for thought.

PS: Urea has a little nitrogen in it too, though it may not be the most available form to the plants.

There are so many issues brought up in the above posts, I am scared to post anything.
1. As rfraser 529 has said hydrogen peroxide is good a removing blood and stains out of fabric because it is a bleach. Just like chlorine- Sodium hypochlorite, hydrogen peroxide is an oxidation agent. Chlorine bleach is a 6% solution of sodium hypochlorite. So diluting 3% hydrogen peroxide is probably wise. Chlorine is used to make drinking water safe. I don't know what the percentage is off hand but it is probably very close to what is being talked about in diluting hydrogen peroxide. Tap water may give you the same results. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleach
2. Hydrogen peroxide H2O2 is unstable and in water quickly breaks down into H2O and O, so any "benefits" as to killing bacteria is short lived and basically on contact.
3. In an open mixed (air can flow through)used by most orchids even many terrestrials there aren't going to be many anaerobic bacteria. What are the name(s) of the anaerobic bacteria that we are try to kill that is bad?
4. Certainly plants can have problems with bacteria, but the underly problem is a cultural problem. A health orchid should have no problem with bacteria. Orchids live with bacteria in the wild. Bacteria is everywhere pouring a little H2O2 into a pot may knock back the bacteria a little bit but it will come back quickly. Depending on the percentage used of H2O2, as noted by some above, can knock back a plant also.
5. All epiphytic orchid roots photosynthesis if exposed to light not just the leafless orchids. All epiphytic and most terrestrial orchid roots absorb oxygen and need oxygen. This why we use an open mix as an orchid potting medium. The break down of the mix that does not allow air to circulate through the pot will kill the roots.
6. I realize this has more to do with African violet growers that over water, but using hydrogen peroxide to cure over water issues is like an alcoholic using some sort of elixir for hangover. Stop over watering.
7. Urea is a source of nitrogen that is available to plants and is absorbed at a rate slower than ammonium nitrogen (ammonical nitrogen) but faster then nitrate nitrogen.
8. In a hydroponic situation H2O2 is used to boost the oxygen in a solution reserve that is near spent and as referenced above in cleaning of a hydroponic system.

I find it doubtful if orchids are grown with good culture that pouring through a pot a solution of H2O2 of enough dilution so as not to harm the orchid will be of any real benefit or noticeable benefit.