Fargro News - July 2007
suSCon Green soil insecticide - Grower Experiences.

Bradford City Council use suSCon Green as their product of choice for Vine Weevil control.

"SuSCon does an excellent job in the nursery and is a better choice for the environment long term than other vine weevil chemical control products"

Tony Wolsky, Production Supervisor at Wibsey Park Nursery in Bradford uses suSCon Green over Bradford's 2-3 acre site, which produces over 50,000 containers. Almost all plants are propagated on site, and then grown on to supply the contracts they carry out or sold from the retail site attached to the nursery.

Bradford City Council began to use suSCon Green when the nursery had big vine weevil problems and has continued the practice over the years. Tony said "The council are obliged to set an example in regard to the environment and we feel that suSCon is the best product for that purpose".

Country Market, Bordon, Hampshire.

Country Market is a retail nursery based in Bordon, Hampshire. Set up in the 1960's as a vegetable growing concern the nursery transformed itself into a nursery and garden centre retail unit in 1978-79 and attracts consumers from a wide catchment area.

Country Market specialises in soft landscape products including spring bedding, herbaceous, but also sells a range of pot bedding and vegetable plants.

Paul Meldrum, Nursery Manager explained that Country Market concentrate on traditional lines although the business has changed in the last few years from producing less box bedding to more patio planters and baskets. Country Market now offer plants in larger container sizes to provide an alternative high value product. The use of the 1½ and 2 litre Pasquini & Bini containers are ideal for producing larger plants as a price attractive product.

Herbaceous modules bought in mainly from Florelite and a range of leading suppliers are containerised into suSCon Green treated compost using Java potting equipment. Compost is supplied from GEM in bulk bags. Paul went on to say "suSCon Green is crucial to our vine weevil control programme".

Van Arnhem Nursery, Godalming, Surrey

The impressive 15 acre site in Surrey has 7½ acres of container plants in production. A wide range of containerised tree and shrub stock on site is sold to the wholesale market, particularly to garden design and landscape businesses.

Jamie Bullard, Nursery Manager, uses a Tref compost mix with suSCon Green incorporated at a rate of 750gm/cu metre. Since switching to Tref, Jamie has seen dramatic improvements to his stock and values the support from the Technical Representative John Summers of Tref EGO.

SuSCon Green has always featured on the site with Jamie insisting that with all mixes incorporation of suSCon Green is essential.

"We have eradicated vine weevil from our containerised production thanks to suSCon Green".

Mr. Verhage who has had a landscaping business in the UK for the past 30 years owns Van Arnhem Nursery. This site opened in 2000 to supply the landscape business but now the site sells to many other businesses and the public.

Liners are bought in from separate producers who incorporate suSCon Green into the mix after which they are containerised into suSCon Green treated compost on site. Shrub container sizes vary from 3-25 litre and trees from 25-350 litres. Jamie has various mixes of Tref according to plant type as each has specific requirements. Jamie said "The customisation of mixes from Tref incorporating suSCon Green works well for us".

More shrub and expansion of the container planting will take place over the 15 acre site with a strategy of consolidating what they have and moving steadily but effectively forward.

Greenscene, Laleham, Middlesex

Greenscene is a national company dedicated to creative planting and exterior landscaping for businesses throughout the UK. Greenscene have a reputation as the UK's leading supplier of quality street hanging baskets (16,000 units) and window box displays and produce vast amounts of plant material for supply to local authorities and various businesses including public authorities, restaurants and public houses.

Mark Illes at Waterside Nurseries explained that their exterior and interior landscaping services were a key function of the group. The ground maintenance division consists of a specialist team of experienced gardeners and trained horticulturists.

The plant production site at Laleham, Middlesex ships product to the Gunnersby site for distribution. The London Market is a key market for Greenscene products.

Mark said, "Vine weevil is a big problem in the London area as the climate is mild and the pest can attack all year round". Mark said "suSCon Green is incorporated into all of our Hardy Nursery Stock container plants, from 3 litre to 25 litre), and went on to say "Greenscene are very happy with the protection that suSCon Green provides to their container production". Liners bought in from ALP (Association of Liner Producers) have suSCon Green incorporated and are then containerised into the various sizes on the site incorporating suSCon Green.

The cyclamen produced are all treated with suSCon Green. The site uses bagged 80 litre Sinclair compost with suSCon Green incorporated into the mix. Mark said, "The use of 80 litre bagged product facilitates handling and ease of movement around the site".

Beechcroft Nursery

Cliff Kimber and Paul Ezard, Manager of Beechcroft Nursery, are enthusiastic about the control that suSCon Green brings to the nursery. "We put suSCon Green into almost all of our stock including conifers, cyclamen, alpines, hardy fuchsias and herbaceous perennials".

Beechcroft Nursery, is owned by and leased from Surrey County Council as a smallholding and has a 60:40 business split between retail and wholesale. "SuSCon Green is safe on the nursery and you can literally put it in everything". "We are very happy with its performance". Cliff went on to say that vine weevil is a major pest that must be controlled. They are particularly attracted to Sedum, alpine Potentilla and Taxus.

The nursery propagate a range of plants on site including Astilbe and Hosta through division, after which they are containerised in a suSCon mix.

Paul went on to say "The market for baskets took a dip last year after the hosepipe ban was put in place. The nursery has had to respond to reducing consumer demand for conventional pack bedding with an increase in patio planters".

Mount Folly Nursery in Hampshire.

Graham and Angela Cowles originally owned a large 4 acre landscaped garden from which their interest in horticulture grew from propagating various species. They acquired the Mount Folly site in 1985 and concentrated on HNS, but the storms of 1987 and 1990 set them back substantially with structural damage.

They then decided to concentrate on soft plant material for a quick return, building up their business on retail sales offering a wide range of colour in plants such as petunias and busy lizzy. 10-12 different colours of petunia and a wide range of pansy colours in the autumn are typical at Mount Folly giving customers a wide selection choice of patio plants with colour harmony in mind.

Mount Folly has 100,000 sq ft of heated area and produces 120,000 soft cuttings in the spring. The staff propagates 85-90% of plants on the site. The rest of the plants are imported palms, Cordylines and citrus from Italy.

They mix their own compost on site to provide the best possible conditions for their plants. Graham and Angela like to be in control of all parts of their business from propagation to the mixes used and incorporate suSCon Green as a control against vine weevil. "We have complete faith in suSCon Green to control one of our major pests". "We decided to use suSCon Green in not only our hardy species but our fuchsias, geraniums, impatiens and other patio plant production and it gives us reliable control".

Dels Nursery, Sculthorpe, Norfolk

Owner Mark Boley has a 14 acre nursery with 4 acres under protection/retail unit and has been using SuSCon Green for a number of years. SuSCon Green is incorporated into the compost especially for the perennial and primula mix which had a number of losses due to vine weevil before Mark started to use SuSCon Green. Ever since using suSCon Green he has had no problems with vine weevil. "Suscon Green is providing outstanding control of this serious pest and customers benefit from having SuSCon in the mix providing peace of mind".

SUSCON GREEN - FOR 2 YEAR CONTROL OF VINE WEEVIL