sicetaitsimple wrote:
I am not a defender of metaldehyde or bare soil, but I do not understand the association ... You can very well be in bare soil and use ferramol.
Personally, I have already explained it many times, it is more my way of doing things: I uncover the cover when sowing or planting, and I put it back (or not, it depends, not on radishes for example !) as soon as the plant has acquired sufficient vigor. And if it is a delicacy for slugs, ferramol during the period of first growth. In short, I am in "rotating bare soil" perhaps two months a year on average and in biomass cover the other ten months!
Do not "reverse" my reasoning.
I'm saying the "bare ground" gardener (implied, sorry, I didn't specify, conventional) 95 times out of 100 don't bother and use metaldehyde. Otherwise, he would also have slug problems, which having nothing else to eat in bare soil, go right over to the vegetables.
But this is not a "problem" for this gardener, since he has methaldehyde, which is very effective. And so he doesn't have a problem with slugs. And finds out when he converts! Its conclusion is then simple. Too simple: it's the fault of the hay (or the straw)!
The "organic" gardener, the phenocultor, the "bare soil" gardener respectful of the environment, for them, it will be a little more complicated because Ferramol seems to me less efficient (does it work with all species, I have some doubts), at least much slower. I have several times experienced the situation where I put Ferramol ... and the slugs were on my carrots, salad plants or cabbages. What I didn't know from the time when I didn't think about it and use the blue granules (very occasionally though - I already didn't like, but with a massive attack it happened to me).
) and I just mowed them this morning: which will make a little extra layer of hay ...