Comment Re:Ignorance (Score 1) 461
This is a highly specious argument. You're stating "espousing one untested toxin vs another more effective one, is equivalent to cargo cult plumbing", when in fact what you are calling "natural pesticides" is rarely the specific and heavy application of a specific "traditional" toxin.
Usually, it's more of a policy of IPM/IPC (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_pest_management ) which is more work-intensive, but contributes less to a pollution point-source, amongst other benefits, by utilizing a collection of methods rather than heavy reliance on a particular manufactured substance. Also, these methodologies decrease financial support of the potentially dubious production/manufacturing process of popular artificial pesticides (organophosphates and IGR's like methoprene). Additionally, it's important to recognize that this same argument uses unspecific wording to group all "natural" pesticides/insecticides together (such as neonicotinoids/pyrethroids/ryanoids versus other common mild herbicide/insectides). That alone should raise "straw-man" fallacy red flags.
I hope you're not really trying to equate RoundUp (or similar) with draping a net over your fruit tree.