[Plantoid]

A while back I was pulling my hair out because of carrot root fly attack and other nasties munching on my baby veg  ( As I'm almost bald you can imaginge the angst I was having )

 Not being able to get the traditional chemical controls any more I felt resigned to losing about 85% of my veg this time round to the pests .

I calculated at 10p a pop for a carrot 50p an  onion set and around £1 a cabbage , cauli , broccoli or sprout plant .
It looked like I was going to take a hit of well over £250 pounds losses even on my small veg beds of only 12 sq mtrs of raised beds.

 I listened in dismay to all your advice as to how you had prevented such attacks  but as it was too late for me I was resigned to the losses till i read about the nematode control " Grow Your Own " by Nemasys.

  I purchased a pack direct from one of the big boys as small garden centers cannot be bothered with it due to having to keep it refridgerated . I think it ended up at £6.90 inc P&P.

Having carefully read the instructions I made up a quarter pack dose of 3 litres  in the nutrient spray pack ( I have one for weed treatment and one for all other health giving things )

 I duly sprayed the  contents of the sprayer over the 12 sq mtrs of beds in two sessions a few hours apart on a drying day thinking, " well It can't do much harm to over do it " . I should have been able to hit 100 sq mtrs with it.
 Once it had dried I then dusted with a new style metalhaldyde slug and snail treatment for belt and braces  cover as slugs had also been eating my dinners.

 Here are some pictures taken yesterday  just over three weeks down the line . The stuff on the draining board are some thinnings . There were only the three  grub damaged carrots . The grub has died and left a dry sawdust type residue but you can see that when I dissected the carrots in slices the damage was minimal .. there was no sign of the grubs at all.
 
The transplanted greens took a big hit from cabbage root fly & slugs .  I thought I would have to burn all the plants but after the treatment  they seem to have recovered somewhat and started to become viable plants again .

 Being so late in getting the seeds in and transplanted due to the builders being 3 months late in doing their job appears to have been a successful gamble .
 The seeds were sown 27 July 2011 and transplanted when a bit too leggy about 6 September  2011 ,after we returned off holiday .

Delicious thinnings we had for dinner



Carrot fly damage



 Dissected carrots show no grubs just the dried residues in the carrots




Overwintering onions doing well and no slug damage on the lettice





Sprouting broccoli  seem to have partly recoverd from cabbage root fly attack , they will be thinned out , the thinnings eaten as a delightful source of soft lightly steamed greens with a trace of salt and butter when they get to about 15 inches across .



3 & 3/4 inch diaameter  non woody turnips ..remaining few in a bed



 The strawberry barrel  is layered in 3  to 4 inch layers of soil ,well rotted horse muck & sharp sand till full .
 The holes were blocked with strips of cardboard then sliced in a cross when the barrel was full and watered.

Down the middle is a two foot length of 4 inch soil pipe to allow soluble  nutrient supply in water / watering when needed .

 It contains 42 plants and if it performs like other barrels I've done in the past it will be a major source of lots of home grown strawbs for puds and jam etc.

[Fleecewife]

What a neat and tidy garden you have    I particularly like the blue barrel for strawbs - please keep us advised as to how that performs in the summer.  Neat raised beds too.

I have never used Nemasys because  of the soil temps required - it's usually too cold here for it to work successfully.  Again, please let us know how it performs earlier in the year this coming season.  Most years I have had problems with cabbage root fly, so I start my plants off in pots.  Even then, there can be problems even before they are planted out.  This year though I haven't had a single damaged brassica - so you will need to carry on your experiment for a couple more years to see if the stuff performs differently in different seasons.

I watched 'River Cottage Veg' last night, where they tried ducks in the veg garden to catch the slugs.  Inevitably the ducks demolished the lettuces

[Rosemary]

I'm sure Dan's used Nemaslug with success at Longcarse - not sure if he's used Nemasys. But looks like really good results.

[Plantoid]

What a neat and tidy garden you have    I particularly like the blue barrel for strawbs - please keep us advised as to how that performs in the summer.  Neat raised beds too.

I have never used Nemasys because  of the soil temps required - it's usually too cold here for it to work successfully.  Again, please let us know how it performs earlier in the year this coming season.  Most years I have had problems with cabbage root fly, so I start my plants off in pots.  Even then, there can be problems even before they are planted out.  This year though I haven't had a single damaged brassica - so you will need to carry on your experiment for a couple more years to see if the stuff performs differently in different seasons.

I watched 'River Cottage Veg' last night, where they tried ducks in the veg garden to catch the slugs.  Inevitably the ducks demolished the lettuces

 Ha ha ha ......HFW ..aka .." Pratt "  .......... seems a typical thing for him to do .

One thing I have been doing for many years is using 3 inch long sections of 44 mm kitchen sink drain pipe ..open at both ends and rammed full of decent seedling soil then carefully stood on end in strong cat litter trays till the  tray is full then I've sown various seeds and as such I means  have sown in a bottomless plant pot . The base of those litter trays have been are carefully drilled with 5 mm drainage holes every 70 mm apart all over the floor.

 Once the seedlings peep up and have gained the second true leaf I use a round dowel that just fits the tube screwed end up on a small bit of wood to push up and out the plug of soil and compost /plant medium ..it has worked well but I never thought of using it in effect as " station sowing "  brassicas to try and prevent root fly attack occasioned by the action of transplanting .

 Using the waste pipe tubes means I have very strong small  long lasting plant pots that can be dumped in a bucket of warm bleached soapywater to sterilize & clean them before re use.

I'll take some pictures in the next few days to show you all what I'm on about .

[Dan]

We used Nemaslug for a few years at our old place with great success. When we first established the veg garden we had a real slug problem and I tried beer traps (partial success) and barriers (no success) before biting the bullet and spending on the nematodes.

After 2 or 3 years application we stopped using it, and the problem never returned. I don't know if we had a self-sufficient population of nematodes (can they overwinter?) or if the slug population had just moved on. 

I love the strawberry planter too, great use of space, we've got some of those barrels and might have to borrow the idea. 

[Plantoid]

Apparently from one of my chemistry and physics pals the nematode  will live on in the dead slug for a few weeks as they slowly eat them and their eggs , they hitch a ride on the next slug in the area by seeking them out . s
So yes they appear to stay in the area and have a feast then slowly spread on to new food .
It might be a good idea to re infect every four or five years to catch any interlopers that come in as eggs or on boots etc.

 The barrel ,
I used an electric jig saw to cut the top out leaving the rim  ..takes a bit longer than just lopping off the top but leaves a protected smooth edge.

 I think the holes are 55 mm hole saw ... measured the diameter of the barrel and then divided by eight  to get the number of vertical rows roughtly 8 inches apart ( worked out almost exactly at 8 inches  ) then used a bit of guttering  and an indelible marker to draw/line the hole orientation lines  up and down the barrel . Then made a guage stick of some thing like 150 mm  and one that came to middle of the barrel height them cut off enough to give the spacing for the two middle bands  .

marked the holes off on the nine lines from top and bottom with the  250 guage and then the middle with the barrel standing on a flat surface .

 Do use a decent marker pen .....in earlier times I used a water based marker or a pencil and found I'd erased the marks more times than I care to count because the plastic of the barrel is so greasy and does not hold the mark made by them

 In the bottom of the barrel I drilled two 15mm dia holes , made two  hanks of three pieces of 10 mm dia poly rope about 400 mm long , tied a thumb knot in them at 300 ish and then carefully pulled them through the holes from the inside of the barrel so the knots and long end stayed on the inside of it &. spread out the legs inside the barrel before filing with " The  mixture ".
This is to give the bottom of the barrel drainage . Didn't do that once and the lower plants died off due to too much water.

[Plantoid]

Well a year on and the beds are doing well far less slug problms than before  far less slugs as well so far .
 Hardly any slug attack on the spring greens  , celery or the perennial kale ..
 There was a little damage on the over wintered carrots & parsnips & sprouts .
The last swede ( 6 in across )  in the beds  looked lovely, till I pulled it out , it tore in half because the slugs had eaten the center out . BTDS that bed got a triple nematode spraying this year .
I've signed up & paid for another three session slug nematode programme  and finished spraying the first installment on Thursday evening then watered it in .
This afternoon I saw a few dead slugs in a couple of beds , especially the one that had the eaten swede in it .
 

[southernskye]

Good to hear it seems to be working.
Fingers crossed the wee devils kill the wee devils:-)
Rgds
Sskye.

[Lesley Silvester]

Where have the photos gone? Other people seem to have seen them.

[cloddopper]

Re missing pictures I filled the photo bucket account and it would not let me delete some of the older stuff . I declined their kind offer of buying more space  and so deleted the whole account as my email addy was tied to it .
 I then opened a new account in a slightly different name using the same email addy .

I think I can find a free picture converter so that website forum members can view my pictures without them being held to ransom by the likes of Photo bucket .
 

[cloddopper]

Just a quick up date .. second nematode instalment arrived last week . ,, it's on the beds  .

 Even before I out it on  the reduction in visible slug damage was much in evidence hardly any thing has been touched save for the first marrow & runner bean  leaves that were there when I planted things out .. .. I suspect that any surviving newly hatched slugs made a bee line to these new plants knowing that they are not nematode infected and had a nibble .
 Hopefully they too will have succumbed to the second spraying of the nematodes

 I bet they were
 

[Lesley Silvester]

Think I might give nemotodes a go. The slug population round here is phenomenal.

[cloddopper]

Up date...
 Amazing absolutely amazing .. hardly any evidence of slugs anywhere in any of the gardens .
 And
Not sure if this is related  ....no cabbage white caterpillars despite a couple of visits from the butterflies a fortnight or so ago ( could be the weathers too cold or not enough sunlight )  .