how do you "drench"?

hi,
i need knowledge on how to use a product called merit 75wg. i've purchased it to use on the lily beetles emerging in my gardens.
merit 75wg is taken up into the lily root system. the beetles eat the leaf and die. the lilies bulb is normally planted 6" deep and will pull itself deeper as it matures larger. there are roots at the base of the bulb and also along the stem that emerges from the top of the bulb, to ground level. lilies are normally planted 1-2 feet apart.
merit recommends drenching when the lily starts to emerge from the ground, using 1 tsp per 10 gallons of water (minimum). a 2 oz. jar (powder) will cover 2,000 sq ft. of garden area. calculating this down, i had 12 tsp per 1 oz. 12 tsp x 10 gallons = 120 gallons for 1000 sq ft of lilies.
i had started the process, with a 2 gallon sprinkler can. i would use 1 gallon for every 1-2 sq feet of ground area around the lily.(ies). i have done about 50 of my lilies and used up about half of the product. thus...i figure i'm doing something wrong here. i have about 140 more to drench
i need help!!!!!!!!!!!!
i tried to look up the word "drench" here in our glossary and could not find it. i also tried to look up on the internet "how to drench?" etc... no luck. so i'm hoping that someone here can help me.

1. what is drenching?
2. how do you drench?
3. about how many inches deep do you need to drench.
4. about how far from each lily stem or group, do you need to drench?

i'm looking forward to your knowledge.
sincerely,
debi z and my little gardening pekingese , franklin ^_^

Drenching just means soaking the soil. You'll need to follow the package directions in terms of how to dilute it and how much area it will cover since different products are going to have different application rates. I think where you got mixed up is on how many square feet to water with each gallon...if you have 1000 square feet total and you have 120 gallons of liquid to cover that area, each gallon needs to cover 8.33 square feet (1000 square feet divided by 120 gallons = 8.33 square ft per gallon). The only other consideration is if you have clay soil that doesn't drain well, you may want to spread each gallon over a wider area and then come back over things twice to allow the water time to soak in rather than having it run off if you add it all at once.

wow ecrane3, i sure did get mixed up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! no wonder it was costing me far to much. LOL oh well live and learn. this is why dg has saved my garden and my pocketbook many times over the course of my gardening career. i started gardening soon after dave came online. i KNEW i was going to need the help of many gardening friends over the years. ^_^
well the good news is, that i was able to finish my garden with the product i had left. i didn't use nearly as much merit / sq ft. now comes the real test..... will the beetles survive or die????
i also have the sevin as a back up.
thanks again for the much needed help.
debi z & franklin

I'm sure you'll at least make a dent in the population even if you didn't use quite the amount per square foot that you were supposed to. I doubt that they write their instructions for the bare minimum that you need to kill...they probably "pad" their numbers a bit first of all to make sure that people are actually successful (if people don't see results, they probably won't buy the product again!) and it also doesn't hurt that the more product you use the more money they make. So hopefully it'll be fine!

i found dead lily bugs in a container and also i haven't seen any around the plants. soooo i think they got dead before they came back out again, after we had a cold spell. YEA!!!!!!!
the first year they came to live here, i had been forwarned the previous year, by poppysue in maine, to look out for these bright red bugs. well the next year they came and unknown to me layed there eggs. i came home from vacation and my girlfriend pointed out to me these gross ugly things under my leaves. well i started to study and was sooooooooooooo grossed out. LOL then i had to sevin every leaf on well over 150 lillies. i wore gloves, having no intension of putting my hands all over the larvae poop. uck!!!!!!!!!!!!!! so i have become quite the detective concerning these bugs ever since the first year. so many people have given up on lilies all together because of them, which is too bad. me........i'm just working at getting the time it takes to rid myself of them each spring, down to a managable size.
thanks again. debi