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As gardeners being organic is important to us, I would think that the almost all of us are as organic as we can be but like most things it's finding a balance with the time you have and what works best for you. While I pick of as many slugs and snails that I find during my day to day jobs in the garden I have in the past use pellets to stop my cabbage or lupins or foxgloves vanishing overnight. I recently made the switch however to a more organic type of pellet that is harmless to birds, pets and children (and costs only slightly more than the standard pellet but works just as well). I do pick off catpillars from my cabbage and squash as many egg's as I can but white's are crafty little bugga's and despite netting still managed to lay (I even used marigolds to try and mask any smells that might drawn them in but that did'nt work). Rather than use chemical's however I used deris dust, a natural insectide that works just as well and combined with picking off the hairy munchers will help destroy an invasion. To avoid whitefly invasions in my greenhouse I use a collection of non chemical controls with sticky traps being the most effective, although you run the risk of trapping sawflys or ladybirds I have yet to trap a single one and instead end up with a trap full of whitefly. So while these measures are not "soil assocation" approved they work and as organic as I can make them.
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Myself I don't use any checmicals in my garden at all, but don't knock people who do.
I've been picking ladybirds of my weeds and putting them on my runner beans that are a bit infested at the mo.
I also read last night about putting jam on the plant which I will certainly try out - juat got to find out where I spread it!
Shortie
"There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children; one of these is roots, the other wings" - Hodding Carter -
Does it matter what flavour jam?
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flowerComment
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I'm mean - they get what they get given!
Shortie
"There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children; one of these is roots, the other wings" - Hodding CarterComment
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When I was a nipper we used to survive on bread and 'mixed fruit' jam - it was an eerie glowing scarlet colour - perhaps try that, it may have colours in the uv range!?
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flowerComment
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Re Jam - was Bob Flowerdew on GQT that said about using jam (he used gooseberry?) to stop the ants from farming (and protecting) the aphids. The sweet sticky goo that the aphids were producing was what the ants were after.Comment
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Maybe...? I was told by someone who couldn't remeber where they heard it
Do you know though where you're supposed to smear the jam.
No Nick, don't you dare!!Shortie
"There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children; one of these is roots, the other wings" - Hodding CarterComment
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I am ready to delete it Nick!
ntg
Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic==================================================Comment
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Hmmmm.... I'm not sure about the whole jam thing. Wouldn't it attract fungus or mould and stuff?Comment
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On the subject of organic approaches (and not meaning to stifle the jam debate but this seems like the logical thread to put this into!), I thought of something last night while tidying up my rhubarb patch. I've got paths in between my raised beds which are full of weeds, so to try and kill two birds with one stone I thought I'd try laying the leaves of the rhubarb down on the path to try and suppress the weeds. The idea is firstly that rhubarb is a nice dense leaf and hopefully will block out the light to the weeds, and secondly the leaves contain oxalic acid which is poisonous, which I'm hoping the weeds won't be able to cope with. Has anyone else tried this approach and if so, how did it work?Last edited by Birdie Wife; 13-07-2006, 12:12 PM.
Dwell simply ~ love richlyComment
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