Onion Fly

[Marb67]

I thought I had seen the last of this pest 2 years ago when all my onions (even the ones in the greenhouse in cells a few feet off the ground) were infected with the white maggots. last year I had no problem. What I did was pulled all onions that were salvagable out the ground, left them to stand in water for an hour r so thus drowning the maggots. At the end of last month I watered in onion fly nemotodes for extra protection. Just cone out to my newly planted out spring onions and there were a couple of onion flys hanging around them. No idea if infected as they are too delicate to pull up and check. I netted the flys and killed them and covered the onions with fleece. I will keep netting them when I check throughout the day and hopefully destroy all of them .

Is there anything else I can do to stop them ruining yet another crop ?

Why oh why do I get so many pests in such a small garden ? Just waitng for the saw fly, cabbage root fly, leaf miner and carrot fly to arrive as per usual :-(

[Marb67]

So nobody has onion fly ?

[Scarlet]

I ve ever suffered with it but a fellow grape who has an allotment nearby has trouble. He now nets the lot with enviromesh, that has stopped the problem. You say you are netting your crops, what are you using?

[Scarlet]

Sorry, on my phone and managed to post twice! I meant to say that I've never had them on my onions or leeks!

[Marb67]

Well they seem to be flying all round every onion i have ( container and soil) i havent netted them with mesh, i meant caught some of the flies with a net and killed them. What i cant understand is i used nematodes for onion fly. All i can think to do is sprinkle rose petals around the plants as a mulch :-(