Farm1 writes

Even in my very big garden, I still only use herbicdes as a very, very
last resort after every other organic alternative has failed - perhaps
once or twice a year on one or two plants. I hand weed and mulch.
Overall, I've been quite surprised at how few organic gardeners there
are in this forum.

'Gardening' and 'organic' doesn't really go together here ;-) Most
gardening books exhort you to use fertiliser at regular intervals and
pesticides for preventative use, let alone cure. GC and DIY shop
shelves are heaving with bottles for growing things and killing things.
We have one or two organic gardening gurus, but they are exceptions.
Prince Charles is viewed as decidedly odd by many for his organic views.

Faced with all this as a newbie gardener, it is quite hard to go against
the grain.

Perhaps it's the garden size thing again? If you can't ever stand more
than 10 ft away from the rose bush in your garden, it's more important
that there shouldn't be a single aphid disfiguring it. Organic gardening
can give you healthy plants - what it finds more difficult to achieve is
totally pest-free plants.


--
Kay