This summer I met a woman who had told me about a method of dealing with nematodes. It is basically preventive maintenance. She said she had learned that when planting a tree its a good thing to put some hair trimmings in the ground as well. Hair is made up of keratin. When its breaking down it attracts microbes that eat keratin. Since nematodes are made up of keratin they get eaten as well. Has anyone else heard of this method of dealing with nematodes?

Thanks,
Little John

PS- I would imagine hair that would be free of hairspray, bleach, etc. would be the best for the tree.

We in gardening are prey to all manner of myths, tales, mediocre and overpriced products, and outright scams and it is hard sometimes to sort them out without considerable research effort.

A nematologist at the University of Georgia once told be that the ground crab shells hold no great promise. That may not mean it has no effect at all though.

i was going to look into a fig that would handle my parents' lcimate in Bradenton, FL, a couple blocks from the north side of Sarasota Bay (zip: 34207). in reading around, i noticed that in tropical-ish areas (z9-z11), nematodes get persistently worse as the zone/temps increase.

i'd read about the 'planting near a wall so they can go under the foundation' trick. my parents have several fruit trees in their yard, mostly citrus, and they mulch with, of all things, those small-ish 1" white landscaping rock, looks like white granite. All of their trees seem to love it. and i wondered....would this effectively act something like a house's foundation?

they also sometimes use sunfaded/white crushed shells and stuff for mulch, since they're so plentiful and cheap down there.

Dan

For my parents' fig tree, they will be cutting through their blanket of centipede or bermuda grass (which is incredibly vigorous in their soil). The grass has been healthy in the yard for a decade, so there is a good layer of organic material soil under the grass, about 6" deep or more. Under that thin layer it's nothing but fine, dark grey and black sand for a couple of feet till you hit water. Their grapefruits, blood oranges, myer lemons, limes and oranges are incredibly fast growing and productive on the property - I remember watching their myer lemon go from a whip to 7' tall and 5' around in a matter of 3-4 years, so we know citrus works...never tried figs.

After hanging out at our house a few times with all of the edibles in the yard, they've started venturing out into other territory, doing garden veggies, and they have 4-5 varieties of passionfruit started now as well. It's a beautiful thing!

Dan