Bordeaux mixture
- noun
- /bɔrˈdoʊ ˈmɪkstʃər/
- Specialized
:
mezcla de Burdeos
- Farmers often use Bordeaux mixture to protect their grapevines from fungal infections.
- sprayed Bordeaux mixture
Examples
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The vineyard's success depended on the timely application of Bordeaux mixture during the growing season.
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Before applying the Bordeaux mixture, be sure to wear protective gloves and a mask.
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While aircraft could not carry enough Bordeaux mixture for effective fumigation, they could easily carry and apply low-volume oil sprays.
Academic text (2002) -
Much early leftist and union agitation around spray work focused on the toxicity of Bordeaux mixture and included demands for protective equipment.
Academic text (2002) -
Yet it may be worthwhile to wonder what might have been accomplished if mitigating the health effects of Bordeaux mixture had been more central to the labor movement's agenda.
Academic text (2002) -
This and their characterization of Bordeaux mixture as "poison" reveal a conception of industrial agriculture as a zero-sum game, in which both nature and technology were on the side of industry.
Academic text (2002) -
The movement from manually sprayed Bordeaux mixture to aerial control of Sigatoka illustrates the complex and contingent nature of the relationship between labor and the environment in agricultural capitalism.
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A plantation-level militant who had worked a stint spraying Bordeaux mixture was more dismissive in his assessment: "The pericos didn't like to join the union."
Academic text (2002) -
In 1969, however, doctors in the wine country of Portugal (one of the last agricultural regions in the world to use Bordeaux mixture rather than newer fungicides) at last gave serious consideration to the complaints of local vineyard sprayers.
Academic text (2002) -
Central American banana workers sprayed more Bordeaux mixture than has ever been applied to any crop: fifty to seventy thousand liters, including 100 to 150 kilos of copper per hectare annually.
Academic text (2002)
Synonyms
5
5.6
A chemical that kills or stops fungus on plants
1
8.3
A chemical used to protect plants from fungus
A blue crystal chemical that people use to kill plant fungus and in science experiments
A chemical used to kill fungus on plants and to stop cell division in labs
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase transparently signals 'a mixture associated with Bordeaux' because 'Bordeaux' (a place/name) modifies 'mixture', so a B1 learner would infer it is some kind of mixture from or linked to that region. However, the specific composition (copper sulfate and quicklime) and its specialized use as a fungicide are technical, not derivable from the constituents, making the term only partially predictable without prior exposure.
Etymology
Bordeaux mixture was named after the Bordeaux region of France, where grape growers first used a simple mix of copper and lime on their vines. They found that this mixture kept fungus away, so the name came to mean 'a spray used to protect plants from disease'.