RE: How much do you tell your readers?

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Interesting issue Andy

My general rule is to give the consumer, our audience,  as much as I think they can handle or are interested in handling.  My experience for the most part is that when you lay a serious problem on them, you can’t give them all the information you had to collect to understand the problem; so by simplifying the explanation they can often get the wrong idea, misunderstand the information, misinterpret the information and generally screw up the whole issue in their minds.  It’s not just the bad issues, try to explain soil microbes to the average American homeowner and why they should care.  Nancy and I spend no small amount of time figuring out how to explain some complex issue in our writing or in our speeches.  I sort of give it to them in small pieces over time.  I believe in the idea that someone has to hear, see and read about an issue at least three to five times before they even get interested.  I think that same formula works for getting information about new products out to the consumers; three to five hits before they even consider buying.  When giving speeches I can always follow the lead of the questions.  I they ask a question that gets me into the topic of an issue, then I feel I can expand a bit.  Otherwise, I dish out the bad news slowly and try to avoid scaring the hell out of people.  I might be scared, but I have not found it valuable to scare my audience.  You want scared, check out what the emerald ash borer is doing to southeast Michigan in only five years.  The growers have had to destroy over $8 million worth of ash trees in the past few months; and it is showing up in Ohio and Indiana.  It is moving faster than any other insect problem so far.  Michigan could lose 20% of its forest in the next five years.  Now that is scary.  The approach here is to help people learn how to discover whether the borer has struck, and to help them understand how to get rid of perfectly wonderful trees and help them work through what to get to replace their ash trees.  So far there is no panic except among the growers.  The tree companies are sharpening their chain saws.  It’s like the wooly adelgid on the hemlocks in the east, only moving very very much faster.

Later,

Jeff Ball

-----Original Message-----
From: gardenwriters-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:gardenwriters-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org]On Behalf Of Hamptongar@aol.com
Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2003 4:36 PM
To: gardenwriters@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [GWL] How much do you tell your readers?

I subscribe to a number of newsletters and bulletins that keep me up to date on insect, disease and various other 'problems' in horticulture.  Much of this information doesn't seem to trickle down to our readers, the ultimate consumers, and I'm wondering how much information other writers get and how much of it they pass on.  As examples...do or have you written about various types of potential contamination in fertilizers (heavy metals and more).  When whitefly was an endemic problem with Poinsettias did you inform your readers?  Have you written about the problems with diseases and viruses that may be endemic in the rose industry (or is this just a rumor).  And more recently, have you been reading and letting your readers know about the potential problems with Ralstonia solanacearum in geraniums?  How about the Asian longhorn beetle?   Sudden Oak Death (SOD)?

Andrew Messinger
The Hampton Gardener
The Hampton Gardener is a Registered Trade Mark
(Published every Thursday in the Southampton Press)