carrot fly
By Vall
United Kingdom
Hi everyone
Any tips on how to avoid carrot fly?
I want to grow my own this year
many thanx vall
thanks to everyone for all the great tips
will try some of them if the dreaded little bugs appear
vall
- 7 Mar, 2009
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carrots
Answers
try companion planting. onions next to carrots are supposed to deter carrot fly on the carrots and carrots are supposed to deter onion fly on the onion.
7 Mar, 2009
Seeing the previous two answeres side by side I wonder if they are connected. I have always understood that the smell of onions distracts the carrot fly, but could it just be the height of the adjacent plants?
7 Mar, 2009
dont know Bulbaholic, its just something i was told by a very eldery gardener when i was a kid. He also grew nasturiums next to cabbages as they seemed to prefer nastis to cabbage. I suspect there will be some science in it.
7 Mar, 2009
By erecting a barrier/net around the bed they have to fly high to overcome it, this then takes them a couple of meters before they come back down to ground level again.
Also they react to smell/scent. If you pull or lift the carrots whilst it is raining or drizzling they can not detect the smell.
I wrote an answer very similar for my college course but used the word "pick" instead of pull/lift. Believe me I lost marks and got told off.
7 Mar, 2009
I have heard, but have not tried, this strange idea to deter the carrot fly : place small handbag mirrors at each end of a row of carrots. The carrot fly (supposedly) sees its reflection in both mirrors and zooms up and down the row, "seeing off" the "intruders" until it drops dead from exhaustion.
8 Mar, 2009
that was harsh treesandthings but i dont suppose anyone will pull /pick you up for it here. lol
8 Mar, 2009
I always plant onions and carrots in the same bed and I've not had problems with carrot flies. You can use anything strong smelling - I've seen basil used as well.
The other good idea is to sow the carrot seeds very, very thinly. That way you shouldn't need to thin them out later which avoids releasing the very strong carrot smell which attracts the flies.
8 Mar, 2009
I like this tip on thin sowing. I'll give it a go this year Little greenfingers.
8 Mar, 2009
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Carrot fly only fly less than two feet above thr ground. So erecting some sort of barrier two feet high round your carrots is the simplest way. Even fine net curtains would do the trick
7 Mar, 2009