28 spot ladybeetle on a Belladonna - with a pristine zuchinni in the background.

Evaluation forms are a great tool for presenters. They tell you much about yourself and your presentation and also much about your audience and their presence of mind.

The talk started, as normal with much to do about building pest control through supporting the ecology in the garden and looking to the health of the soil and the plants.

We talked about the need to select plants for the climate and season and for the prevailing soil types.

We did the excersise with building a food web using the participants as elements of the garden and passing a string between them to build a web and to see it crumble as peices when missing.

We talked about Intergrated Pest Management and the importance of knowing the habits and the habitat of pests and the importance of nutruring the benificials. 

We looked at the impact of killer sprays on the good bugs in the garden and the need to reduce or eliminate their use for the sake of better pest control.

We did a tour of the garden and looked at the impact of pests and the impact of benificials.

And we looked at sprays you can make at home to help control pests. We made a garlic and chilli spray, a white oil and a soap spray and guess what the most popular bit of the whole day was, according to the evaluation form. Almost without exception the sprays making were the talk of the town - oh well!!