Cyndi wrote:
Ah, you're right, Donald, about the horses having certain areas in the field that they use as a toilet. I had forgotten about that. Something else I've been wondering about trying is sprinkling diatomaceous earth on the manure pile and in those manure areas in the field. It would be best to do that on a windless day, which doesn't happen very often, at least not last year....
~C~
Concerns about DE: I have seen a few claims that made me laugh, and some that made me think, thus do research.
The calciferous bodies (skeletons actually) of tiny long dead sealife -diatoms- are very sharp. It is safe to use in food because our moist innards can handle a certainly amount of this sharpness - though I wouldn't recommend large dosages.
There is a concern that if you use the composted manure that has this in it it will endagner the earthworm. Never happen, for the simple reason that earthworms are built to ingest all kinds of coarse rocky matter small enough to swallow. And they have very moist outer bodies - thus aren't going to "scratch."
Those insect creatures with a hard outer shell protecting their bodies are the ones that DE will get. Once their cover is scratch sufficiently they will dehydrate and die.... just dry up.
Flies never have a stage, except as an adult, that might succumb. They leave the pupae and fly off and have very little contact with the DE in the manure. They aren't diggers. Their larvae are but are soft bodied. The pupae stage is very short, likely not long enough to come in contact with enough DE (Unless you wish to spend a fortune). A fly's egg to adult cycle is only about 5 days. Warmer weather might even shorten it a day.
I doubt they have much effect on them from DE. Another reason I chose predator flies. They very specifically target the housefly and barnfly larvae at just the right time.