Hello fellow #nostr and #permaculture fans!

has anyone had this issue? Isopods have 'ringbarked' then proceeded to kill all my seedlings. I love having the buggers in my garden, but they have become an absolute nuisance. all my seedlings are dead.

#grownostr #gardening #tsp

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I have not personally, but a quick search says they mainly eat seedlings when there's a population boom and they run out of the dead plant matter they prefer. Diatomaceous earth sprinkled around the seedlings may keep them at bay.

Leaving a couple inches around the seedlings un-mulched might help as well.

Encouraging habitat for lizards or frogs may help keep the population down.

They can be a pain the arse but they do help make nice soil too. If you want to get rid of them partially boil some rice and either put them or other chitin rich insects like mealworms out in a box in a natural environment like a woodland and hopefully you will capture some chintinase producing bacteria to break them down in to plant food. Mix this inoculated rice up in some unfiltered water pour on the area and hopefully the bacteria will turn all the munching critters into plant food for you.

Yeah I've never had this issue. I'd suspect the mulch and possibly moisture are too high. Time to experiment. I notice in my compost piles when the carbon is higher I get more isopods. I wonder if you added bloodmeal or other high N material might deter them???