Comparison of the insecticidal effectiveness of synthetic and natural myristicin against housefly (Musca domestica L.) and oriental cockroach (Blatta orientalis)

Introduction Parsley (Petroselinum crispum) is one of herbs the most extensively used as a condiment for garnishing and seasoning, but also in perfumery, and in a larger extent in folk medicine. It is a biennial plant belonging to Apiaceae family (Simon and Quinn, 1988) [11]. Parts used in therapeutics are ripe fruits (seeds), root and aboveground parts of the plant. The curiosity is that parsley is a toxin for most of birds’ species, nevertheless it is useful in healing various animals afflictions, for example foot rot suffered by goats and sheeps. In human medicine, parsley seeds are used as a remedy for many different ailments. In addition to its recognized role as a stomachic, carminative and laxative, the herb has also a powerful diuretic properties (Kreydiyyeh and Usta, 2001; Kreydiyyeh, Usta, Kaouk and Sadi, 2001) [5, 6]. The mentioned activities are the result of ingredients present in essential oil from parsley. It contains mainly apiol (chemical name IUPAC: 1-allyl-2,5-dimethoxy3,4-methylenedioxobenzene) and myristicin (chemical name IUPAC: 6-allyl-4-methoxy-1,3-benzodioxole). The average contents of these substances in plants oscillate between 0.1% in root, 0.3% in leaves and from 2% to 7% in seeds (Simon and Quinn, 1988; Krukowska and Gałązka, 2006) [7, 11]. Due to the fact that both apiol and myristicin are toxic for insects, they are treated as natural insecticides (Fuhremann and Lichtenstein, 1979; Lichtenstein and Casida, 1963; Lichtenstein et al., 1974) [1, 8, 9].. It is worth to note that myristicin occurs also in essential oil from nutmeg and other seasonings plants like dill or parsnip (Huopalahti and Linko, 1983; Stahl, 1981) [3, 12]. Myristicin also shows psychoactive properties, but its content is very low in plants enumerated for this purpose (Jakovljevic, Raskovic, Popovic and Sabo, 2002) [4]. In presented work, comparative tests of insecticidal activity of synthetic and natural myristicin against two bioindicators: housefly and oriental cockroach were conducted.