Murihiku — our story

Published date04 November 2021
Publication titleSouthland Express
It stands for Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane.

When I was a kid my father had a small puffer bottle of the powder for domestic purposes – keeping booklice out of the pressed plant collection, killing the silverfish that ate his books and eliminating the carpet beetles that chewed our rug.

I still see that little eruption of powder when I open one of his old books.

No doubt it’s still working on the silverfish.

I haven’t seen a silverfish in Invercargill although, when I was at the museum, we had the silverfish award, presented for inglorious contributions to conservation such as the dropped vase, the rat in the wedding dress and the ink spilt on the ancient manuscript.

DDT is a very effective insecticide developed in the 1870s. It was used in the fight against lice, mosquitoes, locusts and tsetse flies which spread sleeping sickness.

In New Zealand, its use was mostly in fighting the agricultural pests grassgrub and porina caterpillars.

There are several species of each, ironically native.

We do have native plants and animals that have become pests where favourable habitats and plentiful food has led to a population boom.

There is a wood pigeon or kereru infestation in my plum trees.

One plum last season! One! It was a greengage.

The use of DDT increased hugely in the United States after the war.

The population of Naples was dusted and the typhus epidemic ended when the lice died.

It was the new wonder treatment for insect pests, although, even in those days, there was concern about its effects as it was known to kill off beehives and remove beneficial insects.

The increasing...

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