The Wilts!

[Blueaussi]

Will any of those things work against root knot nematodes?

[dice]

Root Knot Nematode control has proven to be a hard problem
in the southern US. Few people realize that there are also
plant pathogenic nematode varieties that can survive in cooler
soils north of the border.

Here is a document describing various control approaches:
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/nematode.html
(Sawdust is listed as being nematode-suppressive.)

A long thread from GardenWeb on nematode control with
some useful advice (what worked and what did not):
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/l...127513433.html

[beeman]

Originally Posted by dice

Here is a document describing various control approaches:
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/nematode.html
(Sawdust is listed as being nematode-suppressive.)
A long thread from GardenWeb on nematode control with
some useful advice (what worked and what did not):
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/l...127513433.html

Thanks. As always your links are fantastic. One of these days you'll tell us how you find them. I Google but these never came up.
Anyway. I believe sawdust is an answer to nematodes. Last year I started adding well rotted sawdust to my patch, the areas I couldn't do due to long term crops are the most affected this year. Odd plants in the middle of a row keel over and wilt on sunny days, just when they start to produce their fruit.
I have been looking for an answer for some time and have contacted T&J Enterprises regarding their BioVam and he said
"BioVam's mycorrhiza fungi will help reduce destructive nematodes. You can also do soil drenches with our microbe tea after Yucca Extract has been added and impact the destructive nematodes. Mixing actinovate into BioVam and applying both products together should work fine"
So it sounds like there is an answer to Root Knot nematodes despite what the 'experts' say. It will be some time before I can report my findings as I'm sorry to say 'winter is coming'.

[dice]

Here is a summary of some research with Actinovate and chitin
that I had found before when a question about Actinovate came
up but apparently had not bookmarked:

SOIL AMENDMENT WITH A STREPTOMYCETE AND CHITIN AGAINST THE NORTHERN ROOT-KNOT NEMATODE (MELOIDOGYNE HAPLA). Jobin, G., and G. Bélair. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, Canada.
Nematicidal potency of soil amendments with two commercial formulation of a streptomycete strain and chitin were first assessed in cups filled with a pasteurized sandy soil, inoculated with 5 egg masses (average of 950 M. hapla eggs per cup) 24 h before application of treatments and left in the dark at 25°C during 30 days. Efficacy of treatments was assessed by counting the number of juveniles (IJ) recovered using the Baermann pan method. The best treatment was obtained with the joint application of Actinovate (105 cfu g−1 dry soil) and chitin at 1.0% (w/w) which reduced by 95% the mean number of IJ per cup (5 IJ/cup) when compared to the positive (untreated) control (102 IJ/cup). The next best treatments were the sole application of Actinovate and chitin 1.0% with a reduction of 86 (14 IJ/cup) and 79% (21 IJ/cup) respectively. The application of Actino-Iron formulation alone did not provide M. hapla control but its joint application with chitin 1.0% gave 85% control (15 IJ/cup). In a greenhouse trial, Actinovate and chitin were further tested on tomato (cv. Rutgers) plants grown in a composite rooting medium made from a nematode-infested organic soil and a pasteurized sandy soil (60:40,w/w) containing 54 M. hapla IJ per 100 g soil. After a 60-day period, the joint application of Actinovate (105 cfu g−1 dry soil) and chitin 1.0% provide the best control with a 73% control level (786 IJ/100 g soil) when compared to the positive(untreated) control (2915 IJ/100 g soil). This treatment also reduced the nematode galling by 86% (247 galls/g dry root) when compared to the positive control (1793 galls/g dry root).

(Above quoted from a Society of Nematoligists conference
report:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/art...?artid=2586450
)

Neither chitin-rich fertilizers nor Actinovate are cheap,
of course, so some kind of nematode-suppressive cover
crop (like a mustard or oilseed radish, maybe, or some
weed that simply has not been tried on any scale yet but
would work great) incorporated into the soil in spring may
be a more cost effective solution long-term when growing
heirloom vegetables with no genetic resistance to root knot
nematodes. I do not know of any research that has been done
comparing the two approaches, but the positive comments on
using powdered mustard at transplant time in the GW thread
are encouraging in this context.

One issue with Actinovate is that it is not active at soil
temperatures below 47F/8C or thereabouts (probably
varies a little with specific populations of streptomyces
and other environmental factors), so it is not going to
do anything for nematode control or anything else until
the soil warms up in spring. Organic soils enriched with
composts, manures, and green manure from cover crops
that generate a lot of internal heat of decay probably extend
Actinovate's period of useful control activity both earlier and
later in the season.

[stevenkh1]

Originally Posted by beeman

New to the forum, joined as I'm sick to death every year watching my plants die from the wilts. Have tried everything in the old books, so am now looking for an answer and hopeful you experts can help.
My garden suffers with the wilts every year, since I added two truck loads of a triple mix about 5 years ago. It was spread very thoroughly over the whole garden, so no matter where I move the patch to, I get the wilts.
I have just discovered Compost Tea, Actinovate and Myke, too late for this year as the plants are wilting again.
My questions. Are the results from these promising? I did find a thread on Actinovate but could not find any conclusions! More discussion, please.
I have tried buying VFNT seeds but still get wilts. Isn't this resistance supposed to help prevent wilting?
I would appreciate some discussion of my problems, it hurts to watch your plants go down.

By chance, do you happen to have any walnut trees near your garden?

I had the same issue of wilt this year: a semicircle of death in the middle-edge of my garden. After my 3rd planting of tomatoes and peppers which again wilted, I looked up in the sky in disgust and something caught my eye: a branch of leaves from a young walnut tree which was growing over the edge of my garden. For 2 months I couldn't figure out why the wilt was worse after a rain...but there it was: a young black walnut tree.

So I called the tree cutter to take down one tree this week, and he said he'll be back later this fall to take that one down.

That side of the garden will have to be corn, beans, and acorn squash for the next couple of years.

Steve

[beeman]

Originally Posted by stevenkh1

By chance, do you happen to have any walnut trees near your garden? Steve

My next door neighbours have two Black Walnuts. But this is not the cause, even areas away from the trees will produce the same results.
I planted broccoli early in the season, they went through, produced good heads, no problem. I recently transplanted again for a fall crop, different part of the garden, so far two plants have wilted down and will be pulled.
I planted two apple trees early spring. Both are sitting doing nothing, and both have odd branches which have died back, different part of the garden.
The range of plants affected is quite extensive, mostly vines, or any fruit bearing plants. They arrive at a point where they start to develop fruit then curl up and die. It's the point where the plant changes over to making seed, the nematodes take too big a drain and the plant wilts.

[beeman]

Originally Posted by dice

One issue with Actinivate is that it is not active at soil
temperatures below 47F/8C or thereabouts (probably
varies a little with specific populations of streptomyces
and other environmental factors), so it is not going to
do anything for nematode control or anything else until
the soil warms up in spring.

Dice That is hardly a problem, is it? You really cannot plant anything at those sort of temps, and I don't think the nematodes are likely to be active?

[dice]

[re: soil temperature and Actinovate]

Dice That is hardly a problem, is it? You really cannot
plant anything at those sort of temps, and I don't think the
nematodes are likely to be active?

I don't know whether nematodes are active at cooler soil
temperatures than 47F/8C. Just pointing out that adding
Actinovate in early spring is probably not useful.

[beeman]

Originally Posted by dice

[re: soil temperature and Actinovate] Just pointing out that adding Actinovate in early spring is probably not useful.

Well I sure hope it is, as I'm pinning my next years efforts on that, to give my plants a leg up to overcome all the problems I've had.