A Green recipe and some Green comment

In my last post I followed some recipes, but wanted to test them out before posting them here.
 I made a Rosemary and Vinegar Hair Rinse- which the jury is still out on. It by no means left my hair easily combable, and it didn't look much different, so I might be searching for a better formula.
The Olive and Coconut Oil soap looks like it turned out well, but has to dry for a few weeks before use, so I will most likely post that in October, along with some tricks I learned that weren't in the recipe.

olive and coconut oil soap - curing

I have been out to the garden this morning to check how the citrus shell slug n snail collectors worked - and yes! I picked a little bowl of the critters and dealt with them appropriately.

The Laundry Powder was a success, and I will be using this from now on:

Grate 1 cake of soap Sunlight or Sards Wonder soap. (I used Sunlight)
1 cup washing Soda
100 g Borax

I crumbled the soap in my fingers, and crushed the bigger lumps of washing soda, but I think next time I will whiz it in the food processor to make more of a powder. 
Use a laundry powder scoop to measure - or experiment for yourself.
This works fine for our frontloader, which requires low sudsing, and is also safe for the septic tank and as grey water for the garden. It dissolved in a warm wash, with no residue and the clothes were clean.

laundry powder

 I found this in our local library - grab it if you see it - it's great.. 

PEST-REPELLENT PLANTS BY PENNY WOODWARD
Organic solutions to garden and household pests

This is a second edition, published in Australia in 2011.
The photography is lovely in this easy to follow little soft cover book of 150 pages.
There are ideas for physically protecting plants using such things as copper collars and plant covers, lots of companion planting ideas, and comment on purchased pest killers among loads of other good information.

I was interested to read that she doesn't use Derris Dust - which is classified as organic, as the active chemical is rotenone, which is poisonous to frogs, fish and worms and may have long term health consequences for people.
Being an Australian book, the section on possums made me feel so sorry for them. "By law any trapped possum must be released within 50 metres of where it was trapped." Not much point really. A bit different to New Zealand where many people go out of their way to run them over on the road.