Page 37 - ALG Issue 2 2015

AD
DV
VERT
ISE
EMENT FEATURE
Tasty fruit & vegetables with Baby Bio® Vitality
Baby Bio® Vitality is a completely new fertiliser range that will help you grow plants with vibrant, scent-filled flowers and fruit & vegetables packed with flavour.
The Baby Bio® Vitality range has a balanced formula that combines bio-stimulants and nutrients in one product. Designed to optimise a plants’ development, this mix creates the Activator Effect, unleashing nature’s full potential.
The Baby Bio® Vitality Range
Top Growth Flowers encourages fast and balanced growth. Plants fed with this produce up to 70% more flowers*.
Top Bloom, with its special blend of micronutrients, produces bright, colourful and long lasting blooms that have thick petals*. Top Growth Edibles encourages strong and healthy plants. In
trials run in Bayer’s research and development facilities yields were 35% higher than crops fed with standard NPK fertilisers.
Top Taste improves ripening and the production of better-flavoured vegetables and sweeter, tastier fruit**.
Top Defence guards against the negative effectives of cold, drought and transplanting. It has preventative and curative actions.
Find out more at www.babybio.co.uk
*Compared to not feeding ** Compared to treating with standard NPK fertiliser
For more information contact Catherine Connan on 07976 669089 or email cathy@ cathyconnan.com. Baby Bio is a registered trademark of Bayer CropScience
37
QWildflower area on a site
I have been given your email address by the Head Office of the
National Allotment Society, of which I am a member.
I need to construct some guidelines for allotment tenants
regarding appropriate pollinators for allotment sites. In addition to this, I need to give guidance about wildflower ‘meadows’ on plots.
As you can imagine with Bristol being Green Capital 2015, there are a number of tenants who want to do the ‘right’ thing by encouraging bees and diversity. However, I am wary of:
a) People that regard wild meadows as an easy thing to have and
an easy thing to maintain.
b) One person’s pollinator being another person’s invasive weed. Obviously there are also the rules about how much of our plots we have to have under cultivation. So some idea of the minimum size needed for a “wildflower meadow” would be a great help.
I wonder if the NAS has ever published any material that will help me. I very much look forward to hearing from you.
Best wishes and thanks,
Lesley Benson, rep on an allotment site in Bristol
AThank you for your question, Lesley. Creating wildflower areas can sometimes lead to heated discussions. But they aren’t any more of a problem than a neglected allotment. In fact, often exactly the opposite because to a certain degree they are managed areas and are not allowed to get out of control.
A couple of points to consider are -
1. ‘Wildflower mixtures’ should be avoided. They often contain a
pretty looking mix of seeds, but they may not be typical of your local area. They will often grow too vigorously and crowd out the indigenous local flora (this could also influence the fauna as well). Some of the wildflower seed used in these mixes can also be imported, which could bring a variety of problems.
2. I would advise you to approach the local or county wildlife trust and get their advice on species to use. It is surprising how
varied the local flora can be just within a couple of miles of your allotment site. The local population of butterflies, moths and bees all require specific plants. For example nettles are an important egg-laying and fodder plant for butterflies.
3. Generally speaking, the soil on an allotment will be too fertile to support wildflowers. Try to lower the fertility by allowing plants to grow and to keep cutting them down by removing all of the foliage. This will exhaust the soil of excess nutrients. A green manure is good for this but use a lifter not a fixer. I have, on occasion, had to remove the top spit of soil and sow the seeds into the sub soil, but this is extreme action to take.
4. For the summer flowering variety, the plants are allowed to run to seed. When the seed cases are dry, the plants are cut down and left on the surface to shed their seed before all of the top growth is collected. Gather the foliage up and shake it to ensure that all of the seed drops to the soil. It will germinate either during late summer or the following spring.
5. When you cut the meadow, other than around seed production time, always collect up the foliage to prevent it from decomposing and re-entering the soil so building up its fertility. If you use a rotary mower, set it on its highest cut and preferably use one with a collecting box.
The National Allotment Society does have a page on Wildlife Gardening with plenty of contact details.
I hope that this gives some help to you. Please contact me if you need further information.
Gardenzest