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Morning Light: The Fetchland Gardening Wire

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Fragile Do Not Bend Apr 2022 3:54pm, 24 Apr 2022 9,612 posts	Quote Pin Fragile Do Not Bend Oh FFS, sawfly larvae on one of my gooseberries already. Is that unusually early? I’ve only had a problem with them towards the end of the summer/autumn before. Hopefully I’ve caught it early and I’m going to have to make frequent checks now.
Hanneke Apr 2022 4:11pm, 24 Apr 2022 88,455 posts	Quote Pin Hanneke Yes, that is early! Meh!
Eynsham Red Apr 2022 4:36pm, 24 Apr 2022 8,708 posts	Quote Pin Eynsham Red We’ve just harvested our first radishes. Nice flavour but not much heat which is a pity.
sallykate Apr 2022 12:18pm, 25 Apr 2022 9,714 posts	Quote Pin sallykate I'm sure I've seen gooseberry sawfly in May (then spent a happy hour squishing them all).
Columba Apr 2022 9:37pm, 25 Apr 2022 21,722 posts	Quote Pin Columba No sign on my gooseberries yet. Usually they (mine) appear quite late in the year.
Fragile Do Not Bend Apr 2022 2:53pm, 26 Apr 2022 9,618 posts	Quote Pin Fragile Do Not Bend No sign of any more sawfly larvae - however quite a lot of small flies which look like they could be adult sawflies. I’ve got some sticky fly paper - meant for indoor use but there’s no chemicals - I think I’ll hang that up in the fruit cage. Bloody things.
3M (aka MarkyMarkMark) Apr 2022 3:22pm, 26 Apr 2022 18,042 posts	Quote Pin 3M (aka MarkyMarkMark) I need to put my cabbage cage up and get the brassicas outside, I think. They keep drying out in the greenhouse! The tomato seedlings are looking good though. As are the garlic!
sallykate Apr 2022 3:29pm, 26 Apr 2022 9,718 posts	Quote Pin sallykate I looked up sawflies. There are two kinds - one appears only in late spring, the other has three lots of eggs throughout the summer, so much later as well.
jacdaw Apr 2022 3:57pm, 26 Apr 2022 3,669 posts	Quote Pin jacdaw Small gooseberry sawfly is the earliest, and has multiple generations per year: sawflies.org.uk Common gooseberry sawfly is commonest(!), multiple gens: sawflies.org.uk Pale spotted is most rare, one gen per year: sawflies.org.uk Sawflies are lovely things, almost every group of uk plants has an associated sawfly. Please be kind to them. Except the larvae on gooseberries and currants.
Flatlander Apr 2022 4:03pm, 26 Apr 2022 2,423 posts	Quote Pin Flatlander 5 weeks ago today I planted my Sutton's Foremost early seed potatoes. They still haven't broken ground yet. With only 1 lot of rain in the last month or more I have twice watered the soil - it is obviously not enough. So far this month, my area has received only 5.2mm of rain - the normal average for April is 43mm!