Ironite Questions?

Why go to all that trouble (to make ferrous phosphate/carbonate/citrate) when ferrous sulphate (copperas) is so cheap?

If you have iron filings, just sprinkle them around the garden.

A pound of iron should cover a lot more than 100 ft^2, but you're also not going to dissolve it that easily. (Me thinks you are just pulling this out of a dark place)

Bob

Reply to
zxcvbob
Loading thread data ...

No one has said it this way, so I will.

There are three integrated subjects: Pests, soil, environment. If you ignore any of these in considering this year's problems you may be beset by them again next year.

With regards to the pests, clearly what you've always done has failed or is failing miserably.

The people you've posed the question to have all given their perspective and many responses have been quite correct.

They may not answer what you see as the urgency of your situation, but you would be served better by following up on some of them as part of an overall plan.

The one consideration I'd like to present with regards to your particular insect problem is pesticide resistance. If they are resistant, the only long term practical solutions, are likely organic ones.

With regards to the soil, iron is a micronutrient and unless something is seriously out of whack with your land, you don't need it. If this year's analysis says you do, kelp as a soil amendment should answer the issue with relatively little work and with 60 or so other micronutrients as part of the package.

If you are going by an analysis done in years gone by, you need a new one.

In response to your comment about organic matter in the soil I'd like to say that the healthier the soil, the healthier the plants, the less tendency for the plants to attract garden pests.

If you've been consistently using both pesticides and herbicides over the years, your garden's soil has probably lost some or much of the biodiversity that builds soil, and when you build up the biodiversity with compost each time you use the poisons, you kill it again.

Reply to
phorbin

I have been in error before, but I don't baffle gab. Now what lead you to your egregiously erroneous conclusion?

formatting link
sulfate ---> FeSO4·7H2O (most common)

at. wt. Fe = 55.845 S = 32 O = 16

SO4 = 96

H2O = 18

FeSO4·7H2O = 278

Fe / FeSO4·7H2O = .2 = 20%

---------------- Greensand 17% iron: 40 lb bag good for 700 sq. ft.

1 - 40 lb bag = 6.8 lb iron

6.8 lb iron / 700 sq. ft. = 0.00971429 lb / 1 sq. ft.

0.971429 lb / 100 sq. ft.

You can do arithmetic, can't you Bob?

Reply to
Billy

"Marie Dodge" wrote

Did I misplace a decimal somewhere? I'm sure you said 900 square feet was the size of your garden.

Are you from the school that if a little does good, more will do more good?

You are way out of kilter with what such a modest garden would require.

I'll also make note of something you said in another post. You said that you put leaves directly on the garden in the fall and till them in in the spring. I would suggest composting the leaves with grass clippings in a separate compost pile. High carbon directly on to the garden has a tendency to steal away the nitrogen. You want to satisfy compost's nitrogen need before it hits the garden. That will also allow beneficial microbes to develop and supply high levels of beneficial humic acid.

Steve Young

Reply to
Steve Young

Hi Penelope, Thanks, Will go to wikipedia and see what I can find out.

Richard M. Watkin,

Reply to
R M. Watkin

Hi, zxcvbob, Thanks for that tip, I will make a not of it.

Richard M. Watk>> >>

Reply to
R M. Watkin

You mean her inability to pay for all the expensive supplements she was directed to purchase rather than simply answer the questions she asked.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

The three gardens come to roughly 900 to 1000 sq. ft. combined.

No. I wasn't raised to be wasteful.

You're 100% correct but we don't have enough grass clippings and no one to rake up those we do occasionally have. They're sparse, light and left to decay on the lawn. The lawn is some kind of Bermuda grass that is fine and needs little mowing.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

Like a lot of other stuff you're going to read on these gardening groups. And if someone can't afford to buy and pay shipping costs on everything recommended, they're insulted, degraded, belittled and more. I can see why so many of the old posters from the 90s are no longer on these two groups.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

Sorry but that is not true. I bought Organicide (oils) and so far the whiteflies are still on the plants, as are the spider mites. Neem Oil didn't work either. It's been well over a month since I started spraying the plants and so far so response. What did work, but can't be used on Vegetables, is the Systemic I used on the flowers. That worked in about a week. The flowers are clean. The veggies, stinking like cod liver oil are still infested.

I am very familiar with Kelthane. I couldn't find anywhere online that sells it. As far as I know it does contain DDT and is persistent where sprayed. Two sprays and the mites would be gone - and stay gone! I've use it in the past. I was told it's no longer sold in my state. The horticultural sprays don't work on the SMs and WFs here. Perhaps their overuse by organic gardeners has caused tolerance.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

Just plain old horticultural oil, like what you use for a dormant oil spray on fruit trees. (I believe "Vlock" is the brand I have; I bought it at Walmart when they were clearing out the garden stuff to make room for Christmas stuff.) It should have directions on the bottle for using it half-strength as a summer oil spray.

Sounds like you bought snake oil again. ;-)

Bob

Reply to
zxcvbob

Right. That's why we try to use as much organic matter in the soil as possible. Raise our own seedlings or carefully choose well grown, insect free ones from the Nursery in town. Blood and bone meals are now too costly for us so we switched to 10-10-10, surfer and Ironite. The west garden, like the other two, had lush beautiful plants until the WF and SPs infested them!

Which organic ones since Pyrethrum and the hort' oils don't work.

It's needed because the natural high calcium, the high PH prevents plants from obtaining it. This is a poor limestone clay soil I have to work with. It's naturally poor in nutrients and high in PH and calcium. That's another reason I stopped using the bone meal for phosphorus and woodash for potash. These organic products were adding to the problem. The cost of blood meal for nitrogen put it out of reach now.

If this

I just had a new one. Everything was fine again this time but nitrogen. They recommended 5 lbs of Ammonium Nitrate per 1000 sq. ft. of garden or 1 to 1.5 lbs per 100ft of row. I was happy to see the PH at 7. We have no idea what that would be in an organic product.

I've heard that since the 1960s and haven't found it to be true. Insects and bugs will attack any plant they find that's part of their food preferences, be it healthy or sickly and stressed. To them it's FOOD or part of their reproductive cycle. That healthy squash will be as quickly infested by SVBs as the sickly one in your neighbor's yard. That gorgeous Impatiens will be as infested with spider mites as that half dead one on your friend's porch. Insects and bugs don't discriminate and have no immunity to infestation.

There was no poisons in that garden. Why would I waste time and scarce money spraying a new garden plot that never had a problem before and just laid fallow for 2 years? It was gardened for one season, laid fallow for two due to my accident, and planted this spring. I must have already posted this

10 times already. The two older gardens became infested AFTER the new one,... but not with SPs, just the WF. One of the old gardens is now totally infested with WF. The organic sprays were useless in that garden also. >
Reply to
Marie Dodge

soil test showed plenty of organic matter. OM isn't the problem. Resistant insects and spiders are. Pests are becoming resistant to everything we're throwing at them.

Then you don't have the heavy poor fine clay soil we do.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

"Marie Dodge" wrote

Why not pull it around in the spring too, when grass is growing well? It'll give you green stuff for your pile. Collect spoiled produce thrown out from a commercial establishment or 2.

I'm not in favor of this, uncomposted carbon will steal vitality from your garden for at least 3 months.

I think you're right, but I have much the same problem and tilling is the only way to get the material into the hard clay. It gets better each year and my sight is toward the day I can do less to none.

It does, but the ultimate goal is increased carbon, which is accomplished.

Yes it does, less is better. It's said that recently disturbed soil requires twice the nematode count per square foot to be effective.

Have you asked the earth worms?

They're not resistant, you've simply cultivated an inviting environment, rather than an environment that's hostile because of natural beneficial predators, i.e. BT, nematodes, beneficial microbes & funguses, or any of these handy helpers:

formatting link
> I never even do any tillage (and for me, that's gentle forking) of the

Or has been working the soil long enough to have arrived.

ah, just as I thought :)

Steve Young

Reply to
Steve Young

I'll second the motion ;O)

Reply to
Billy

Yeah, we don't want people to know how useless so many of the organic potions here are - do we?

Reply to
Marie Dodge

So, do you go to the nursery and ask the manager, "Where's the most expensive and useless 'organic' products you have? That's what I want; I'm gonna show those r.g idiots how full of shit they are!"

You're buying the wrong stuff because you want it to fail.

Bob

Reply to
zxcvbob

You're right. Organic pesticides are indeed snake oil and just as useless. I bought the mix for summer spray. It's called Organicide. It's made mainly from fish oil and smells bad. The WF and SM don't mind the oil at all, even when drenched in it. It has no effect on them. Neither did Pyrethrum. It seems as each organic snake oil product fails another is recommend. Four have failed now. I'm not keen on running through the large number that may be out there, none working better than these that already failed. It doesn't matter though since that garden has been abandoned. The plants will be pulled up this week and all the debris burned.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

The kind of grass we grow makes almost nothing when cut. It's fine bladed. It's not worth the effort to drag the huge thing around for the few pounds of clipping he'd get. They're left on the lawn so we don't have to start fertilizing it like our neighbors do to theirs. You keep removing the grass and soon you have to start fertilizing your lawn. Fertilizer almost doubled in price this year. Commercial establishments are not close to where we live, and because of liability, will not give away spoiled produce. People were apparently eating it themselves and not giving it to pet rabbits and goats.

We use it mainly for soil amendment, not as a fertilizer. It's needed to break up the fine clay. I switched to chemical ferts this year. Because of the high PH problem I can't use bone meal for phosperous/minerals or wood-ash for Potash/minerals anymore. The PH finally came down to 7 in the gardens. We can't get enough grass clippings or green weeds to make a good compost mix. I don't keep livestock anymore nor do any of my friends so no more manure. No more green cover-crops after that nightmare with winter rye and clover. What's convenient where you live may not be convenient or possible everywhere.

And I read that exposing the harmful nematodes, insect pests, their grubs and eggs to the sun and wind and cold in spring kills them in large numbers. So more turning over of the soil is better. I don't buy beneficial nematodes so that's not a problem for me.

Yes, they all said the leaves, twigs, shredded bark and chipped branches, kitchen waste etc were delicious. :)

pests. Why do you think they keep developing new ways to fight pests? I didn't create anything. God created it. It was woods until 4 years ago. This is new garden that laid fallow for 2 years. It was never sprayed with anything. It was organically fertilized 4 years ago with sulfur, compost, blood and bone meal and woodash. The garden that year was fine with a minimum of pests. It was very productive. No sprays were needed and none were used. It's a shame the BT, nematodes, beneficial microbes and funguses weren't pleased with these natural organic products. A real shame because the earthworms loved it to the point the moles had it looking like a mine field. What should I have used, something like 5-10-5 ?

This garden is only worked for the second time and never worked without adding organic material. Each tilling or turning turns under organic matter including partly rotted leaves, weeds and kitchen waste. Whatever is on the pile on that side of the property gets turned under. Unlike you we don't have sandy soil. We have a hard dry clay that's low in everything but calcium and moisture.

Reply to
Marie Dodge

So what are your natural predator numbers like?

Do you have lots of tiny birds in the garden? I get WF each spring but within a week there is not a sign of them because all the tiny birds feast on them.

Reply to
FarmI

HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.