A popular Instagrammer is showing gardeners a natural and nontoxic way to keep insects away from their vegetables.
Using nothing more than an onion and some water, the gardener says he is able to keep his plants free of pests.
The scoop
The Reel was uploaded on the Instagram channel of Char and Marv (@plantedinthegarden), which has 525,000 followers.
"You can also add garlic which has a similar effect," the narrator adds.
The clip starts with the narrator holding an onion and telling us how "this is old-school, and it can keep insects away from your vegetables."
They go on to tell us how the onion should be chopped into small pieces, put in a jar full of water and left there for one to two days.
After that, the liquid is put into a bottle sprayer (using a strainer to save the onion pieces for later) and used to spray the solution onto the leaves.
"The sulfur component in onions keeps bugs at a distance by producing an odor that bugs hate," the narrator concludes.
How it's helping
Hacks for keeping harmful insects at bay are a great way to save money since items like water and onions are much cheaper than insecticides.
But the benefits go well beyond the savings.
Insecticides can damage ecosystems and poison our waterways since they can seep through the soil and find their way into groundwater.
These chemicals can also be harmful to people and pets as well as other animals.
Also, most insect-killing solutions come in plastic containers. About 40 million tons of plastic get thrown out in the U.S. each year, and only about 5% of that gets recycled.
What everyone's saying
"Old school methods are tried and true," one commenter wrote.
"This works! And groundhogs, squirrels, and other critters hate it too," another added.
"Was that a small onion or a shallot?" one person asked, to which Planted in the Garden answered: "It's a shallot, but yellow onion will be stronger. It's all I have on hand."
"Thank you so much for this tip. I need this for my cauliflower plants," another commenter wrote.
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