This season continues to be a challenging one and here is our approach in the battle against slugs. Rolling consolidates the ground and gives the slugs less room to move around, this slows down slug damage to our sown wheat seed. Rolling also helps seed/soil contact which assists germination and pushes large stones out of harms way. Where possible we have drilled wheat seed slightly deeper than normal at 40mm. We have used metaldehyde for our first 'in field' application with ferric phosphate on the outside 6m. We are limited in the amount of metaldehyde we can use in the autumn and will switch to ferric phosphate as weather deteriorates.
before rolling......
after rolling!
This is a very good demonstration as to the importance of cultural control measures, combining deeper drilling with consolidation. Work by the UK Soil Management Intitiative showed that where this was successfully employed less slug pellets were used on farms with min-til/Direct drilled crops than ploughed ones.
ReplyDeleteUsing less slug pellets and more targeted applications will give metaldehyde a longer lifespan. This autumn will certainly show increased levels in water in the Severn Trent and Anglian regions. The case for cultural control and ferric phosphate may gather momentum.
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