"Bob" wrote in message
...

"Janet Baraclough.." wrote in
message
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The message
from "Franz Heymann" contains
these
words:

By the way, if you used "organic" means other than the highly
ineffectual ladybirds to control aphids, you are also killing
off
your ladybirds. They will simply die of hunger if there are no
insects around for them.

Is there research that shows they don't simply fly away to find
aphids
elsewhere?

Janet.


Last year I had hundreds of ladybirds living on a patch of
Euphorbias. A
month later they had all flown away and the neighbouring plum tree
was
swarming with aphids - so a fat load of good they were.

I've used no insecticides in the garden in the 3 years I've been
here, and
the fruit trees are being eaten alive! In the past two years, all
the
leaves had been sucked dry and had fallen off well before autumn.
The
"natural balance" obviously doesn't occur at a point compatitble
with what I
want from the garden, so I'm beginning to think that spraying may be
required to give my trees a chance!

Of course you should. These "natural" ways of controlling the local
balance of nature are mostly hyped up codswallop.

Franz