“Is dawn dish soap safe for plants and grass?” is a relevant question for gardeners. This is one of the milder soap and detergent solutions on the market.
Still, you must dilute it first with water before using it for washing plants and getting rid of pests and insects. This article has outlined the several benefits of safely using this dish detergent and soap on household plants.
Contents
Is Dawn Dish Soap Safe For Use On Plants?
Yes, dawn dish soap is safe for use on plants but only if it is diluted with water. You want to check for a diversity of this soap that is as pure as possible with the minimum amount of additives.
– Undiluted Dish Soap is Harmful
When using these soaps on plants, take care to dilute it properly before use. To stay on the safe side, use 20 parts water for every one part of soap. Undiluted or improperly diluted soap solution harms the plants and disturbs the pH of the soil.
Watering the soil prior to using soapy water also helps prevent damage to the plant. Never use soap solution on arid soil. The same principle applies to grass as well because undiluted soap is said to cause it to die.
– Constituents of Dawn Dish Soap
The good news is that all dawn soaps and dishwashing liquids are environmentally friendly and made from sustainable ingredients. Like most soaps, these products also use water as their primary solvent, along with liquid surfactants. The surfactants used in dawn dish spray platinum powerwash are 99 percent biodegradable and include sodium lauryl sulfate and sodium laureth sulfate.
These products have been created keeping the highest standards of sustainability in mind. Even though these are mild detergents, they do their job of cleaning stains and dishes. Their ingredient list also contains antiseptic agents that decrease the bacterial load from surfaces.
Looking at their ingredients list, it is clear why these soaps and detergents from dawn are safe for plant use. They do not contain phosphates and phthalates, both of which harm cell walls.
They are also triclosan free ever since this antibacterial and antifungal agent was banned by the FDA. All of these reasons make this brand of soap the ideal choice when it comes to certain home-based plant care activities like getting rid of pests and bugs.
What Are Some Benefits of Dawn Dish Soap for Plants?
Some benefits of using dawn liquid soap for plants are that it kills the topsoil and helps get rid of weeds. In diluted form, it acts as a mild insecticidal soap to eliminate common bugs like aphids, mealybugs, and spider mites.
– It Helps Control Weeds
This soap is an effective weed killer and is a milder alternative to using harsh weed eradicating chemicals. Once your grass and plants are all grown with established roots, you can use this soap’s diluted solution to alter the chemistry of the topsoil.
This kills off weeds that continuously germinate and grow all over the lawn. The plants already planted and well established in the soil are not affected that much. After application, wait a few days until the weeds turn brown, dry, and wispy. Sometimes, the dawn solution will have to be applied more than once to get the optimal results.
Dead weed will have to be removed manually by hand once soap water has killed it. The topsoil too has to be replaced by a new layer of soil that is well mixed and healthy for grass growth.
– It Can Get Rid of Pests
Soap and dishwashing products from dawn are also quite effective as insecticidal soaps. Although these are relatively milder soaps, applying them in diluted form every week helps kill both adult and larvae forms of bugs. Almost all common garden pests and insects can be killed this way, including aphids, mealybugs, spider bugs, and scale insects.
Washing a bug infested plant with a homemade insecticidal soap will get rid of the majority of them. Place the plant under a faucet or outside in an open space. Use a soap solution using dawn detergents to wash it as thoroughly as possible.
Take a toothbrush with soft bristles to scrub the bugs off while cleaning. Allow the plant to dry first, then spray with the soap solution weekly with a spray bottle.
– It Helps Clean the Plant
You can also use dish soaps to simply wash a plant that has gotten too dirty. The same goes for cleaning a lawn that has been left unkempt for far too long. Take a large bucket of water and mix soap in it at the ideal ratio of 20:1.
Then use it for washing the grass and all the plants with it. Leave the soap solution to rest over the plant for 10 to 15 minutes and then wash it off with clean water.
– It Is Not Harmful to the Environment
The thing about this particular brand of soap is that all varieties have been manufactured in an environmentally-friendly manner. It does not contain any ingredient that stays in the soil long term to pollute the underground water supplies.
As we have discussed, most of the top ingredients in these products are biodegradable. In fact, the dawn ultra dishwashing liquid is made of 35 percent post-consumer recycled content.
What Are the Natural Alternatives of Using Dawn Dish Soap for Plants?
Natural alternatives to using dawn dish soap for plants are neem oil, white vinegar and soda. All of these can be used in several homemade solutions and used in the same way as the dishwashing solution. These options are far safer to use for both plants and humans.
– White Vinegar
White vinegar that is used at home is a better alternative to using dishwashing for plants. It is mild since it contains very little concentration of acetic acid in it. Still, it would help if you diluted it first to protect the leaves from getting chemical burns.
Mix white vinegar with clean water to a ratio of 50:50 and spray it no more than once a week for pest eradication. You can also make this solution in several gallons of water and use it to kill weeds growing in the lawn.
– Baking Soda
Soda used for baking is a household staple that is also quite popular among gardeners and lawn owners. Like soap solutions, it can be used in several DIY solutions to get rid of weeds and pests from plants and grass.
A standard yet effective recipe is to take one gallon of water and add just three tablespoons of soda to it. Half a tablespoon of vegetable oil makes this solution stick to leaf blades better. Spray generously on plants with pests and see the outcome with just a couple of uses.
– Neem Oil
Neem oil is a powerful antiseptic agent drawn out from the seeds of the neem tree. This is one of the best natural resources every lawn care enthusiast must have in their pantry. Neem oil has the potential to disrupt the life cycle of pests during all of their life stages and so gets rid of an infestation very quickly.
Instead of going for commercial dish soaps, purchase 100 percent organic neem oil. Dab a few medium-sized drops on a piece of cotton to apply it all over the affected plant. Or you can mix two or three teaspoons of oil in one entire gallon of water and use this solution in spray form.
FAQs
– Will Dish Soap Kill Plants’ Roots?
Dish soap will kill plant roots when used without dilution with water. This is true when the soap is made of harsh chemicals like bleach that are toxic to plants. Milder soaps and detergents like the dawn, dove, palmolive, and castile soap are safe for plant use.
Conclusion
Whether it comes to getting stains off dishes or getting rid of pests, dish soaps from dawn can do it all. Through our article, you learnt all about this soap and how it is useful for plant care.
- Soaps and detergents from dawn manufacturers are made from sustainable ingredients and are safe for use on plants when diluted.
- A well diluted soap solution is made when one part soap is mixed with 20 parts of water. Another option is to mix four to five tablespoons of liquid soap in one gallon of water.
- This diluted solution can be used to kill aphids, mealybugs and almost all other common bugs of plants using weekly sprays.
- You can also use this dawn soap spray to get rid of weeds and invasive species growing in your lawn.
Now that we have established how this soap can be utilized for various other purposes in plant care, you can use the information from this article to grow healthy and thriving plants.
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