Campanula, you are right to be concerned. There are unwanted consequences to every bio-control agent out there. I work in ecological restoration and we really dislike preying mantises and crab spiders, both non-native insect eaters, and we aren't wild about the store-bought ladybugs either as they are an Asian species and they appear to be pushing out the native ladybugs. Things like ladybugs and mantises are generalist predators - they eat whatever they can fit in their mouths. Not good for native species! Parasitic wasps tend to be more specific but still no guarantees. We really dislike Bt as well as it kills all caterpillars - the pestiferous ones and the native butterflies all. My boss doesn't like any bio controls - bugs introduced to control invasive weeds or insects. They will eat native species in the same genus as the target pest, for the most part. The USDA does run tests before it allows these bio controls to be released but their focus is not the same as ours - they support agriculture, and native ecosystems are expendable. Ditto for the EPA's tests of biological pesticides - they don't run them long enough or thoroughly enough to uncover all their negative side effects. The needs of agriculture trump environmental health. But, there are no undisturbed ecosystems. Our gardens are all highly disturbed. Garden plants usually are not native and are planted in disturbed, amended soils and watered with imported water and fertilized with imported materials. Even native plants are exposed to imported diseases and pests and unnatural conditions. I feel it's unfair to the plants to do nothing for them when diseased or attacked by insects. I just keep in mind that there are NO 'safe' pesticides - all have unintended effects on nontarget organisms. And bio control agents won't willingly starve to death once the target pest is gone - they'll eat something else if at all possible. I use cultural controls as much as possible, and companion planting to encourage a mix of beneficial insects and predatory birds. I've also come to the realization that perhaps I should leave food production to the professionals! there's plenty of small scale producers selling at the local farmer's market and I should be supporting them since they do a much better job than I ever could in my little urban backyard.

"It may well be that these sewage wastes are not listed by OMRI because no one has asked for a review, if the products were unnacceptable they would be listed as unnacceptable. That's not the case. OMRI has discussed biosolids and sludge for quite some time and their issues isn't just on heavy metals. From this 1997 document that biosolids and sludge. OMRI considers that sludge is synthetic for several reasons. Sludge composition varies widely, but inevitably contains a number of constituents. In addition to organic matter from human waste, sludge also contains a broad range of synthetic substances that have been intentionally or accidentally introduced into wastewater. These include synthetic polymers, surfactants, metal salts, and industrial by-products. Commonly used household products form another source of synthetic constituents found in sewage sludge. These include soaps, detergents, cleansers, solvents, and drain cleaners. Many of these products are surfactants based on alkylphenol ethoxylates (Talmage, 1994). That document also indicates that the USDA NOP has it classified as synthetic. There is a lot of information on both sites regarding biosolids. Might need to search for "sewage sludge" as it is more commonly referred to on the USDA site. Both of those bodies are pretty picky with things. For example, lime is fine but heat lime to make burned lime and it's not fine, add water to burned lime to make hydrated lime and that's not fine either. I know that people throw all sorts of things down their drains and that people complain about how water and aquatic life are being contaminated as a result. Aside from they icky factor of spreading around other people's waste my biggest concern is contaminants. Add to that all the prescription and non prescription drugs people take and it sounds less appealing. I also have to pay quarterly sewage fees to get rid of it I'm not going to pay to buy it back :) I think people consider it sustainable and like it for that reason but sustainable and organic are not synonyms and do not always overlap. I'm a bit surprised kimmsr. I've seen you criticize the use of genetically modified corn as organic fertilizer.

First, do some research on the available chemical fungicides. If environmental concerns are your top priority, then understand that many chemical fungicides are less damaging to the environment than are many organic ones. Most chemical fungicides are also much less potentially damaging to the person spraying than are even the mildest of insecticides. If you wear proper personal protection at both during mixing and applying, then your risk of contacting enough of the chemical to cause yourself harm is rendered exceedingly minute, and this is for chemicals who have a lower toxicity profile to begin with. I've found that BannerMaxx combined with mancozeb will give you 95-99% control of BS, and this is in a climate much hotter and humid for longer than most, except for Florida. If, after fully informing yourself of the choices available and the consequences of each one of those, you choose organic methods to control disease, be aware that the first principal of organic gardening is to get rid of the disease magnets. That may mean elmininating most of your hybrid teas, as they are not really suited to growing organically in most of the East. Concentrate your energies on the roses that have at least some resistance to disease and your results will be far more pleasing. You must be willing to accept some damage to your roses as a total gardening philosophy. Growing roses organically doesn't mean you just substitute products and achieve the identical spotless results. Also be aware that roses with poorly controlled disease are far weaker going into winter and have a much greater chance of not surviving even mild winters. That again makes your cultivar choices of primary importance. The most effective organic fungicide that I've personally trialed for preventative spraying is horticultural sulpher. It must be applied at least weekly, and during times of rapid growth like in early spring, sometimes twice weekly in order to coat the most rapidly growing foliage. It had an effectiveness rate of 40% in my trial, meaning that Angel Face, a rose that will defoliate 100% with no spraying, will retain 40% of it's foliage if sprayed regularly with sulpher. On a more resistant cultivar, of course the retained foliage % would be higher, but I find ANgel Face a good "lab mouse" with which to judge a spray's effectivity. Sulpher has a tendancy to burn at temps above 86°, which is highly problematic in my location as we regularly have many many summer days with temps above that. None of the baking soda and horticultural oil formulations that you may hear regularly touted had any effectivity approaching even 10%. Neem oil, while a decent enough insecticide, burnt leaves badly and also wasn't terribly effective. Copper is is good, but it burns worse than sulpher and can build up to toxic levels in the soil and is far more dangerous to the human than is sulpher. The more folkloric remedies of milk and cornmeal aren't even worth the bytes...

Well after starting this thread I have figured out that gardening simply isn't simple and that I have a LOT to learn...so here goes... (BTW I have 5 tomato plants with flowers, and one plant has a baby tomato! And they are still in 1 gallon containers! The poor things!!!) tapla (mid-MI z5b-6a) said: "I agree it's a container, but you can 'fix' drainage issues and change it to a bed by using something like weed barrier as the mesh at the bottom (anything that allows water to pass - you could even use heavy Visqueen with a hole poked in it in a strategic place). In order for it to ACT as a raised bed, you can build a sag into the liner on top of the pallet such that the soil at the bottom of the sagging portion is in contact with the earth. This requires cutting a hole at the bottom of the sag. THEN, it's a raised bed because there is a direct pathway for water in the soil to make its way out of the container cum bed and into the earth. It won't drain as fast as a raised bed but it will drain as completely, with the exception of any water that might get trapped in the valleys formed by wooden slats on the pallet. Al" ----------------- In this example you gave, I am not sure what you mean by a "sag." This is hard to visually imagine. I looked up the word in the dictionary and it means a depression. The visual picture in my mind is a pipe filled with dirt that runs from the bed into the ground (this would be like a wick I guess?). Reminds me of grounding electricity. Is this what you had in mind? And in this example that you gave with a sag, what soil would be used in the bed: container mix or something more like jon's formula?