In article ,
AriesVal writes:
|
| I'm wondering if you have ants in the soil around your beans Stephen? I've
| noticed in the past that ants seem to 'farm' blackfly. To discourage ants
| in the past I've used a mixture of baking powder and sugar.
| http://www.howdididoit.com/home-gard...-control-ants/

If he doesn't have, his garden is so toxic I wonder how anything lives.

While there is a LITTLE evidence that ants are associated with worse
aphid infestations, the explanation is elmost entirely that the ants
are following the aphids. Nobody, despite numerous requests, has
ever produce a scrap of evidence that targetting the ants reduces
aphid infestations.

I have done some fairly careful though unsystematic (for a statistician)
observations, and in all the cases I have seen it was clear that ants
were NOT making the black bean aphid infestations worse and were NOT
spreading the infestations.

The recent wet weather has confirmed that. The number of ant nests
in my garden has dropped by a factor of well over 10 - perhaps 20-30.
The aphid infestations have not changed in the slightest, not in
number, severity or properties. But, NOW, a lot of them don't have
ants on because there just aren't the ants ....


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.