circumstances only the adult worms will come to the surface to feed”
“Under normal
grass and is extremely damaging to the ecology of the soil.
Why then do we have such difficulty controlling worm casting? The answer lies in the soil! A worm-colonised soil will have, at any one, time; eggs, juveniles and adult worms. Under normal conditions, only the adult worms will come to the surface to feed. Juveniles generally remain in the burrows and feed below ground. When they mature the adults come to the surface to feed, deposit casts and to mate with another worm. As soon as they have mated the eggs are released, fertilised with sperm from the other worm and sealed in
a sack, which is deposited at the bottom of the burrow. As you are probably aware earthworms are hermaphrodites (they have the reproductive organs of both sexes) and therefore both individuals will produce eggs after copulation, doubling their reproductive capacity. When we use MBC based wormkillers we can only control those individuals that are adults at the time of treatment. A few weeks after spraying, juveniles start to develop into new adults and we begin to see a few casts appearing on the surface. By the time the problem has got bad enough to spray again, a whole new batch of eggs have been laid and so the worm
colony survives.
Having understood a little of the biology and behaviour of earthworms we can use this knowledge to our advantage and get more reliable results in dealing with the problem of worms. We can take two approaches to this strategy; firstly we should consider discouraging worms by cultural practices and secondly we can use wormkillers more effectively. Starting with cultural practices, the first thing that comes to mind is to remove the source of freely available food and that will involve collecting grass clippings when mowing and removing fallen leaves from surrounding trees in the
autumn. This is not always feasible on large areas such as sports pitches and golf course fairways but, if it is possible to ‘box’ the clippings, this will help reduce the severity of the problem. Secondly, consider improving the drainage of badly infested areas. Worms need plenty of moisture to move around in, so drying the ground will help to slow them up. The third consideration is the soil pH (acidity) - earthworms prefer a neutral or slightly alkaline soil so, in some circumstances, we can discourage them by lowering the pH with careful use of acidifiers such as sulphur. This is by no means an
Proven systemic ingredient.
Readily absorbed by the plant through it’s root sytem.
Long lasting protection from Fusarium Patch and Dollar Spot. Rain or irrigation after
application will not reduce effectiveness.
Caste Off
A new broad spectrum systemic fungicide for disease control and worm cast suppression.
Caste Off contains 500 g/L Carbendazim. Caste Off is a registered trademark of NuFarm. ALWAYS READ THE LABEL, USE PESTICIDES SAFELY.
Sherriff Amenity, The Pines, Fordham Road, Newmarket, Suffolk. CB8 7LG Tel. 01638 721888 Fax. 01638 721815
23
www.pitchcare.com/re
www.sherriffamenity.com 57
Can be used for the suppression of wormcasting.
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