GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

Jeff Layman · 12-01-2008, 05:23 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

wrote:
On 11 Jan, 18:09, "Jeff Layman" wrote:
wrote:
The reason I asked the question was that I thought your original
posting was misleading (but didn't know for certain), and you have
confirmed it. Quote: "I would also check with your allotment
committee and your plot neighbours if this is allowed and if they
don't mind.". Using "If this is allowed" makes it sound official,
which is isn't. You really shouldn't make your prejudices about
chemicals appear to represent official - or even unofficial - policy.

You will find than the majority usually takes the day. In this case,
if by committee there's an agreement, it will become the rule. It's a
bit strong to think my opinions are prejudices. It's what I beleive
in. On a 10 rods plot there's no need for chemical use. Give me a good
reason for this.

Not prejudiced??? This is from your next paragraph: "but if I can make
change the views of those who do use chemicals, I'll do it in everyway I can
and make our allotments entirely organic, and across the country if I can do
that too!". As to what chemicals may or may not be needed on an allotment, I
can leave that to others who have used them. But if I had cabbages being
decimated by cabbage white caterpillars, I wouldn't hesitate to spray them.
If a fungal disease hit a potato crop, I'd use what I could to knock it out.

I have absolutely no objection to you believing in
organic cultivation, and following those principles. And as you ask,
no, the point of having an allotment is to grow whatever the holder
wants, how he or she wants (within reason), without affecting the
other allotment holders.

As Sacha's article in the time points: "There are also concerns with
what is used in growing food. Allotment gardeners tend not to use
chemicals at all and when they do, they at least can control it." And
that's what I meant indeed. It is a choice - but if I can make change
the views of those who do use chemicals, I'll do it in everyway I can
and make our allotments entirely organic, and across the country if I
can do that too!

Fine. I would be happy to turn two deaf ears to your blind prejudice.

I am afraid that an "all organic" allotment makes little sense to
me. I don't have an allotment

Well that's perhaps our misunderstanding.

, and in my garden I use as few chemicals as
possible, but I can't see the point in having whole plants destroyed
and doing nothing about it.

Organic gardening is not 'not doing nothing about it'. I suggest you
learn a bit more about it before attempting to convince me that it
doesn't work.

Of course it doesn't work on anything other than small scale (and I am not
fully convinced of that either. But then again, I am happy to admit that
pouring unlimited chemicals on plants isn't sensible either. The best way
is a balance between the two, but zealots like you can't see that).

The world has seen organic production in action before. In fact, before
there were any chemicals, production was "organic". And the result? Most
of the time it worked well enough for people to survive (have you ever
wondered where the term "subsistence farming" came from?). But, on
occasion, something disastrous happens, and populations get wiped out. Ever
heard of the Irish potato famine? Maybe a million people died. Yes, the
cause was partly political, but the original problem was the wiping out of
the potato crop by blight. Now, if there had been chemical control
available, the disaster could have been averted. But it wasn't the first
time there had been a problem with the potato crop. Here is long extract
from Wikipedia:

"Although central to everyday life in Ireland, the Irish potato crop was an
uncertain quantity. The famine of 1845 was notable for its vastness only:
according to the 1851 Census of Ireland Commissioners there were 24 failures
of the potato crop going back 1728, of varying severity. In 1739 the crop
was "entirely destroyed", and in 1740 and 1770 the crop largely failed
again. In 1800 there was another "general" failure, and in 1807 half the
crop was lost. In 1821 and 1822 the potato crop failed completely in Munster
and Connacht, and 1830 and 1831 were years of failure in countys Mayo,
Donegal and Galway. In 1832, 1833, 1834 and 1836 a large number of districts
suffered serious loss, and in 1835 the potato failed in Ulster. 1836 and
1837 brought "extensive" failures throughout Ireland and again in 1839
failure was universal throughout the country; both 1841 and 1844 potato crop
failure was widespread."

That is what your slavish following of "Organic" culture would lead to if
everybody followed it. Don't you realise that the only reason you can
happily grow your plants organically is that 95% of the rest of us are
spraying ours and so killing the vast majority of pests before they get
anywhere near yours? We are effectively ringfencing your crops.

Actually, that's not quite true - I give up trying
to grow plants where chemicals have failed to control the pest
because they are ineffective or the pest has grown resistant (eg in
this area, anything which is edible to the lily beetle).

So you've used something stronger or have you given up eating
vegetables all together?! It's precisely why you should not use
chemicals in the first place. There's a reason why you are failing and
I would, if you give me more information about the crop you have
attempted to grow, show you that you can grow absolutely anything and
control the pests and weeds without using chemicals.

No, I eat lots of commercially-grown vegetables. I avoid eating organic
vegetables as much as possible because I believe it would be hypocritical to
eat them, and it also encourages something which I would not be happy about
(see above concerning the potato famine). As I have been doing this for
around 60 years, I have a strange feeling that your concerns about chemical
sprays on health are a little wide of the mark.

And what if they ignore the advice, and start using insecticides?

It's a shame. But like you, they'll manage to saturate their garden
where it will take a long time to re-establish the ecosystem.

You are assuming that the ecosystem will need re-establishing. It may
become temporarily unbalanced as certain pests are killed (and
plant-friendly insects too, unfortunately, if the treatment is not done
carefully enough), but we aren't talking about soil sterilisation, so don't
exaggerate.

You are obviously very confused about glyphosate. As soon as it
hits the ground, it becomes inactive. It is the bane of organic
gardeners because they can't find anything it does other than what
it is supposed to - kill plants it is sprayed on.

My problem with it is the instant killing of everything without any
understanding of why weeds are there in the first place. Glyphosate
takes with it habitats, without habitats you don't have insects,
without insects you don't have birds - that is my problem Jeff, not a
the fact that it is a chemical per say, but the destruction of
environments which support insects on which your, YOUR food stuff
depends on. You are in effect removing what benefits your garden the
most for the sake of easthetic and nothing else. Easthetic! Now that's
sad, don't you think? You could just pull them up, dry them and
compost them or use them as mulch.

Glyphosate doesn't kill insects. It kills plants. Now, the original
question was about clearing plots on allotments. And if you can show me the
practical difference of using glyphosate, and you and your mates digging up
a whole plot and removing all the plants in order to clear things such as
couch and ground elder roots, I'd love to hear it. We aren't talking about
a single plot in isolation from all others - your insects will simply move
to the next plot to get the food they are missing. And so will the birds.

I can only think that you are just imagining that "their front row of
flowers didn't interest much wildlife".

No, they come to admire my rows full of colours and life with
scabious, geums, nettles, aquilegias, echinaceas... as opposed to the
single huge dahlias proped up with canes and strings sandwiches
between two badly pruned rose bushes that they think is the ultimate
in flower growing! But that's a matter of taste perhaps.

This is not what you were saying. Again, you are twisting the facts to suit
yourself. You can't compare a row of dahlias and a row of mixed flowers
whether or not each are organic or chemically treated. You must compare like
with like. But that wouldn't satisfy your prejudice, would it?

If the glyphosate had hit those
plants there wouldn't have been anything around for the wildlife to
take an interest in,

Indeed. You are right. There's nothing there beside two rose bushes
and some dahlias with fancy tags on to keep them upright.

See above. I admire your skill with non sequiturs.

and if it hadn't those plants would have been no different from
any other.

I think allowing a range of plants to grow is a good thing for any
garden. Think about it. If you just nuke everything, you'll take out
the good with the bad. Doing things by hand, and I stress here on an
allotment plot and not acres, is a good thing. By the time you've
finished tackling persistant weeds, it would have benefited another
part of your garden by providing an habitat. That's the cycle that you
need in a garden. That's gardening.

No, that's YOUR gardening. Who said I nuke everything? I can selectively
use glyphosate just as I can selectively pull up plants. I just wish it
worked more effectively on some plants.

Did you do a comparative wildlife survey with flowers in organic
allotment plots?

Not on allotments but I did one last year on 4 acres of urban land
derelict for 10 years. It was an eye opener.

So you are comparing derelict land with organic cultivation?

Did _you_ try the leeks? What was their taste like?

Off course, I'll try anything! And I prefer the smaller ones. The big
ones were not as sweet and one leek was sufficient for one soup in my
house! A range of plants, food crops and a mix of fruit bushes is all
an allotment needs - not rows upon rows of spuds and massive leeks,
which are exactly what those plots have, with two roses and dahlias on
strings. But that the plot holder's choice. Isn't it.

What? You admit the plot-holder can have a view different from your own? I
take it all back - there is hope for us yet.

--
Jeff
(cut "thetape" to reply)