Conkers

ben_m_g

Never heard the spiders and conker thing.

I would say that I would struggle to believe it, DD has a bit of an obsession with conkers and the outdoors in general at the moment (twigs leaves nature etc).

I kid you not we much have 50+ conkers in the house, most of them stash in a drawer in a phone table.
You would never guess where I just had to clear out a load of spiders from...

Elsewhere

*shrugs*

As I said, it works for us, though the Royal Society of Chemistry thinks otherwise (from New Scientist 27/4/2011)

• We at the RSC assumed that there would be some interesting chemistry behind spiders' apparent dislike of conkers, so we set the public the challenge of proving or disproving the tale.
The best theory we were given was that certain terpenes in aromatic woods are known to repel insects; the supporting beams of many old buildings were built from sandalwood for this reason. A type of terpene known as triterpenoid saponin is found in the brown skin of horse chestnuts, and might well repel spiders.
However, the most convincing evidence argues against conkers' efficacy. It was submitted by a class of 9-year-olds from Roselyon School in Cornwall, who videoed their well-planned and executed experiments. [STRIKE]The video can be seen on the RSC blog (!!!!!!!/NZoxE)[/STRIKE] (try https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdZRMM2VSR4 ) and is an admirable demonstration of the scientific method and arachnid-related bravery from such young minds.
Jon Edwards, Media Executive, Royal Society of Chemistry, London, UK

nilequeen

ben_m_g wrote: »

Never heard the spiders and conker thing.

I would say that I would struggle to believe it, DD has a bit of an obsession with conkers and the outdoors in general at the moment (twigs leaves nature etc).

I kid you not we much have 50+ conkers in the house, most of them stash in a drawer in a phone table.
You would never guess where I just had to clear out a load of spiders from...

The mind boggles!
Where?

nilequeen

Davesnave wrote: »

What about edible chestnuts?

They will be in the shops now.

Those of us lucky enough to live in the Westcountry might even harvest our own.

Will they contain the same natural repellent though?

PlymouthMaid

There have been loads of conkers and sweet chestnuts in my area this year. I am not convinced about conkers and spiders either as I have them laying around just because I like them and can't resist picking them up but I still have house spiders.

Davesnave

nilequeen wrote: »

Will they contain the same natural repellent though?

No idea. Just threw it in as an easy source, and if they don't work people can always eat them.:D

Remember I'm one of the sceptics, having seen the Roselyon School video before I joined this thread. A few dodgy bits of methodology, which probably wouldn't have got past the kids in my class, but better science than many youngsters experience!;)