Australia's Science Forum

Hi all,

I have a teacher who has asked for something to paint onto jelly beans to deter the students from eating them.
Something like the solutions you can buy to discourage nail biting.
Any ideas of something we may have on hand????

TIA
Helen

Yes, you can buy that from the chemist. Can't remember the name but, it has a bittering agent to stop kids chewing their nails. It is non-toxic, non-hazardous so pretty safe to use.

Bitrex is the name of the product they put into nail polish. Manicare have one called Bite No More.

Thanks Merilyn, but he was asking if we had anything on hand that he could use......not a commercial product.
Dare I say.....a chemical we would have, a safe one of course!!

Hmmmmmm.......that sounds like a BAD idea!!

LOL , soak them in Methylated Spirits . Our Australian stuff contains a strong bittering agent ...not particularly non-hazardous though....but it stops Winoe's drinking it without poisoning them .Unlike America where they actually add Methanol .

have to ask why a teacher would choose to use an edible Lollie in class and got to lengths to discourage them being eaten ?

Is it importance of using jellybean's due to them being small and colourful ? If so , why not use coloured counters or the likes ?

I also have to wonder who gets the job of painting probably a hundred Jellybeans in nail polish

bigmack wrote: ↑08 Aug 2022, 14:33 LOL , soak them in Methylated Spirits . Our Australian stuff contains a strong bittering agent ...not particularly non-hazardous though....but it stops Winoe's drinking it without poisoning them .Unlike America where they actually add Methanol .

have to ask why a teacher would choose to use an edible Lollie in class and got to lengths to discourage them being eaten ?

Is it importance of using jellybean's due to them being small and colourful ? If so , why not use coloured counters or the likes ?

I also have to wonder who gets the job of painting probably a hundred Jellybeans in nail polish

bigmack,
what can I say......he's young
we have decided he will buy some commercial nail biting solution and no I have not volunteered to paint said jelly beans!!!

J wrote: ↑08 Aug 2022, 14:13 Hmmmmmm.......that sounds like a BAD idea!!

J,
yes, we've had a discussion and he's buying some nail biting solution.....

Sorry I missed your point. But I wouldn't have anything here that I would use.
I used to do this at another school. Used jelly snakes and only had to paint one side of some of them. May have even been just some of one colour. It showed how animals could adapt to not eating something poisonous or unpleasant. Kids soon learnt not to eat a certain colour even if there was a chance of it not being treated.

If you were concerned, I guess you could use those terrible flavoured jelly beans - menthol, vomit etc Ghastly!

Bigmack - I think the bittering agent here is Methanol

You can get a spray one called thumbs away that has the same effect (stops thumb sucking rather than nail biting) which would be a whole lot easier for application to jelly beans!

What is the practical that he is doing that needs to use jelly beans? I also would definitely NOT use methanol as a bittering agent. If you have heard of tourists overseas becoming extremely ill/poisoned after drinking dubious alcoholic beverages, that is the ingredient that has been added to the alcohol. Makes you very sick or could kill you. If he is doing something like chromotography using jelly beans tell him to forget it. It has rarely if never worked. Talking from experience and years of having to convince teachers to use other ways of doing that particular practical.

Merilyn1 wrote: ↑08 Aug 2022, 14:53
Bigmack - I think the bittering agent here is Methanol

Methanol is a denaturant .It is added so the ethanol can be sold Excise tax free . It actually has no smell or taste and is unfortunately why it gets mixed with ethanol and passed to kids to drink on the cheap . They have no idea they are drinking it .

Bittering agents are added to Metho to make it mouth puckering and to cause vomiting .
Here's an SDS snip from Diggers , who supply Coles , Black and Gold as well as the NZ market . None of it has methanol . However my comment was tongue in cheek
I wouldn't actually recommend it .
Incidentally , Diggers do make a version called "Special Methylated spirit" which does contain Methanol .So I was wrong that all Aussie Metho is methanol free . Also of interest , Methanol poisoning is treated by giving patients intravenous Ethanol . The idea is that the Body will work to remove the ethanol before the Methanol . Otherwise the body metabolizes the Methanol converting it to Formic acid , and that is what kills the body .
While the body is working to process the Ethanol , the methanol passes through without metabolizing

This is such an interesting website. You learn something new almost every time you open it up. Who knew about ethanol and its life preserving effects.

Hey thanks Bigmack for the clarification! I had seen a SDS which included methanol at some point.
Interesting factoid about the methanol treatment. Thanks for sharing

Thanks everyone for your input!
Yes it is an invaluable site! So many interesting things to learn!!

We did this for a number of years, until we had one student who said it made her feel unwell and nauseous, got a huge complaint letter from the parent, never done again.

MariaQ

Get the jelly beans out of a bag with offal in it in front of the class. I tell the kids they dont eat in the science room due to contamination, and they believe me.

Same we tell the kid we have a mouse infestation and food stuffs are out of date by 2-3 years. Classroom management.

We often burn cheezels for the grade 8 energy prac. I have kept a box that has the use by date of 2010 and put the new packet in the old box and send into the classroom, no one wants to eat cheezels that are that far out of date!

Wayne wrote: ↑17 Aug 2022, 14:46 We often burn cheezels for the grade 8 energy prac. I have kept a box that has the use by date of 2010 and put the new packet in the old box and send into the classroom, no one wants to eat cheezels that are that far out of date!

Love it, I have a Maccas Cheese burger from 2010 that until this year with all the wet weather and humidity has only just developed mould. I'll have to buy a new one and start again. First few years it still smelt like a cheese burger.