Faery Folk & the Soil
 

It's well known that the Good People can be kept at bay with iron: an iron horseshoe nailed to your front door, a pair of iron scissors suspended over an infant's cradle and so forth.

But here's a thought. Gnomes and other faeries who actually dwell in the soil itself, caring for plant roots and generally maintaining the soil structure, must surely have the standard aversion to iron - and yet there's no shortage of places in this world where the bedrock is ironstone and where consequently iron oxide pervades the soil itself. It would seem fair to assume that no faery being could hope to survive in iron-saturated soil: and yet while large areas of Devon have extremely red soil due to the presence of iron oxide, those same areas are renowned for their faery populations, including gnomes.

How can this be? Or are faery folk only affected by smelted iron ore, because of the concentrated nature of it?

Do feel free to comment, especially if you're a gnome.

a gnome did roam far from home, he traveled between Rome and Nome.
along the way he met some fey, they offered him to stay and play.

i've heard tell that the majority of the planet is composed of Iron...
instead of being a "water planet", it would be more accurate to
describe this as an "iron planet" [the mass of this world is nearly
identical to that of iron apparently].
gnomes are representatives of the fey race, who are guardians
of the earth, using magic to protect her interests. it seems highly
unlikely that the fey would concern themselves with protecting
the very thing which acts as their kryptonite. it must be the
idea of "worked" iron which seems repellent to them [i surmise].
the notion that what the planet has in abundance is used as a
means to bend and 'dominate' over mother natures' will would
be the aggravating factor is my guess.