The Great Green Scam

[Noisette]

Just a heads-up for anyone whose thoughts are turning to the garden...As we are all being encouraged to help save the planet, a lot of the products that we've used in the past are being withdrawn. BUT there's some very dodgy marketing going on out there. Take insecticides....if you look closely at the packaging of KB, Fertiligène, Naturen etc, the 'active' ingredient is...colza oil. Just that. An oil that you can buy in litre bottles in the cooking oil aisle for a couple of euros. The principle is that it suffocates insects. It probably also suffocates the plants that need to breathe through their leaves, but hey-ho. Then herbicides....'active' ingredient 'acide de géranium'. It doesn't work. Might as well use cheap white vinegar, or salt where nothing will ever be grown again. Then caterpillar control...Bacillus thuringiensis is a very effective preventative and cure for infestations of all caterpillars...processionary pine, box, olives, leeks, codling moth. It IS natural and only harms the caterpillars. BUT you don't need to buy separate products for each problem! They're all based on BT. Please, please read the (tiny) print on the packaging before you waste your money on these scams.....

[Alan Zoff]

Going off at a slight tangent but similar message. When buying car parts, I always search against the part number rather than just the make and model of the car to see if it is common to other vehicles. My Alfa has a General Motors diesel engine used in a variety of cars, including some Vauxhalls and Saabs. If I buy it as a Vauxhall part, exactly the same item by the same manufacturer can be half the price quoted for the Alfa part. This applies to most of the engine bits. The heater resistor is also fitted to some Renaults and costs far less as a Renault part.

As Noisette suggests, it pays to look beyond the large print. Scams everywhere.

[alittlebitfrench]

A Saab made by GM is not a Saab....thank you.

Italian tomato puree made from tomatoes from China is another scam.

[woolybanana]

So, a SAAB is made of Chinese tomatoes or just the tins?

[Théière]

[quote user="alittlebitfrench"]A Saab made by GM is not a Saab....[/quote]

But a car made by GM could be a Saab [:)]

[nomoss]

Speaking of scams, a friend years ago bought a pest killer, 100% guaranteed to kill any living garden pest.

He received two small wooden blocks, and the instructions:

Place one block on the ground.

Place pest on block.

Place second block on pest.

Hit second block with a large hammer.